Power cuts plague city, but worst not over yet

NEW DELHI: With the power demand staying in the 5,700MW-5,800MW range, complaints of outages shot up in the past few days. Discoms claimed there was sufficient power but the transmission network did not have the capacity to handle the increasing load. Experts said that till Delhi gets proper rain, the high humidity and heat will continue to increase the reliance on coolers and airconditioners.

According to discoms, the worst is not over as they still anticipate a peak demand of 6,100MW-6,200MW in days to come. Meanwhile, complaints of regular interruptions in power supply over the past one week have been coming in from several parts of the city. Dwarka residents said they were miserable the entire week.

"Every day we face power cuts from two to four hours and the discoms cite a localized problem. If new power lines have to be laid, why wasn't it done before the peak summer?" asked Jayati Mehta, a resident of Sector 21.

"There is no electricity since the last six and half hours. The unscheduled power cut has ruined my weeklyoff and this humid weather is only adding to the woes," said Ranjeet Kumar Singh, a resident of Jasola area.

From areas like Kondli, Vasant Kunj, Uttam Nagar, Safdarjung Enclave, Mayur Vihar Phase II, Madanpur Khadar, a number of complaints of outages have poured in. Residents of Mayur Vihar II said that the situation had become particularly worse in the past three days when the heat was at its peak. Incidents of power lines snapping, transmission lines tripping or sub-stations developing snags have also become common in the past three days.