Pak: People protest in Peshawar against frequent power outages

Hundreds of people in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province held a rally in Peshawar against prolonged power suspensions and demanded repair of the damaged supply lines, according to a media report.

Despite the commitment, officials of the Peshawar Electric Supply Company (PESCO) were reluctant to ensure a smooth power supply to his constituency (PK-72) and the people had to face prolonged power suspensions, Dawn quoted the Member of the Provincial Assembly Faheem Khan, who led the protesters, as saying.

"We persuaded the people to remove the illegal connections and installed thousands of power meters in different localities as per commitment with the PESCO officials, but the consumers are still facing unprecedented load-shedding," he complained.

The PESCO staff was reluctant to repair the damaged power supply lines, said the lawmaker, stressing other pending issues such as bifurcation of supply lines, issuance of photometers and others, according to Dawn.

Khan also informed that he held a meeting with the PESCO chief and presented him a list of demands. "We also asked for the replacement of SDO and superintendent of Tajabad subdivision for not resolving the consumers' issues," the lawmaker added.

The main reason for the power suspensions was line losses ranging between 80 to 95 per cent, said PESCO spokesperson Shaukat Afzal, emphasising that it was impossible to ensure continuous power supply to the areas where the people were not ready to remove illegal connections.

The spokesperson also informed that the main cause of damage to supply lines and transformers was overloading.

( With inputs from ANI )