The Hindu : Unscheduled power cuts making things worse

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, May 16, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Andhra Pradesh

Unscheduled power cuts making things worse

By Our Staff Reporter

Vijayawada May 15. People of Vijayawada, who are already reeling under severe heatwave conditions, the unscheduled power cuts being resorted to by the A.P. Transco is sapping them further.

The prolonged hours of power cut is making life miserable. In the absence of specific timings for shutdown, people are caught unawares. Power is particularly disconnected between 7 a.m. and 11 a.m. in most areas, when people will be preparing to go to their places of work. This is also the time when people will be switching on borewells. At a number of colonies, residents complain that either there is no water supply or inadequate water in the areas due to unscheduled and frequent power shutdowns. Again, there is shut down in the afternoons and one is not sure when it will be restored. In some areas, power is disconnected at 9 p.m. and restored only the next morning.

Senior Transco officials, speaking to The Hindu, admitted that the department was resorting to unannounced power cuts, but expressed helplessness. ``We go about doing the job as per the instructions of the head office at Hyderabad. Normally, we resort to such emergency load relief to avoid collapse of the grid,'' an official said.

Normally, the grid was expected to maintain a rate of 48.52 to 52 cycles per second. But, if it dropped to even around 47, there was possibility of the whole grid collapsing, which can plunge all southern States in darkness, an official warned.

Official sources here, however, complained that at the Central level, decisions were taken offhand and whimsically.

For instance, whenever the grid was on the verge of reaching the peak load capacity, instructions were issued to different districts to give load relief. And mostly, due to political compulsions, the burden this time was being transferred to coastal districts when there was heavy demand from Telangana region, including the capital city.

Apart from the threat of grid collapse, the failure of the Rayalaseem Thermal Power Station (210 MW) and the Kakinada Thermal Station (210 MW), besides the 500 MW Simhadhri project during the past four days had compounded the problem.

The DE Technical, V. Rajashekar, admitted that there were unscheduled cuts in the city, but maintained that it was only for a few minutes and not hours as was being alleged.

Mr. Rajashekar said the situation would improve in the next two-three days once the RTPS and the KTS were rectified.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Southern States

Stories in this Section

DA increase for Govt. staff

300 power employees arrested

Jagmohan orders closure of Nizam's jewels exhibition

Inauguration of TTD museum galleries tomorrow

Kurnool selected for total sanitation drive

Unscheduled power cuts making things worse