Dawn.com
By-Sadia Qasim Shah
People are spending sleepless nights and living under a constant misery due to excessive power breakdowns. Looking at how things are, those responsible seem to be just some sadists. Indeed, these are hard times for a common man.
All the government has been doing in the recent years is to move clocks one hour forward to save power in an effort to cheat the reality of record loadshedding with no cogent plan to solve the problem.
In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, excessive power outages have affected everyone`s life. People of the urban areas are suffering frequent and unannounced power breakdowns while in rural areas people have to put up without electricity most of the time. Those seem to be reliving times when electricity was not provided; life was peaceful then, we hear from the aged ones.
One wonders why the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province rich with hydel, natural gas and mineral resources is so poor when it comes to facilities derived from these resources.
But why would those having a facility think about the have-nots. The lucky ones don`t need to worry about loadshedding as they have resources to manage heavy-duty generators. The VIPs or those who are just very important persons because they have been elected by people or assigned duty to serve the public and the country are enjoying double power connections. If one power-line goes off the other is turned on.
In this darkness, there are some rays of hope. The Peshawar High Court is hearing a suo motu case against excessive power outages by the Peshawar Electric Supply Company (Pesco). Now one is not sure whether the case would continue to be heard during the entire summer and make any difference in the lives of the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, but at least it questioned the power utility and the relevant bodies about the hike in power tariffs, distribution system and excessive and discriminatory loadshedding hours in urban and rural areas.
The PHC also asked about their failure to meet the requirement of 1.7 million electricity consumers of the province, which is generating at least 3,600 MW hydel power against its consumption of 1,700 MW. Interestingly, around 17 per cent of the total generated electricity has been assigned to the Pesco under the government`s approved policy.
The ongoing court case has raised some serious questions based on latest facts and figures about the province`s capacity to produce hydel power and the little share it is receiving.
Another positive move to safeguard the public interest was initiated by the Human Rights Commission of South Asia by filing public interest litigation against the power tariff increase by the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) for Pesco consumers. One very pertinent point it has raised is that the Nepra should provide the due share of power to the Pesco consumers and end loadshedding before increasing the tariff.
The commission has also questioned the imposition of fuel adjustment charges on the province, which is producing hydel power with the lowest rate of Rs1.01 per unit for the Central Power Purchase Agency (CPPA) and buying the same back at an average rate of almost Rs10 per unit from the Pesco.
The commission has contended that since there is no thermal generation or IPP unit in the province, therefore, imposition of fuel adjustment charges on the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is unjust and unconstitutional.
Whether judiciary would get the people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa some justice and alleviate the troubles related to excessive power outages? Hope is after all what keeps you going in tough times.
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