Powermen busy restoring electricity ascitizens face harrowing time post rains

 

 

 

THOUGH thunderstorms are not unusual in city, the Thursday evening squall would be remembered for a long time as citizens faced harrowing time. Many localities went without power for nearly 24 hours post thunderstorm. As per meteorological office, the city was hit with wind that had velocity of 30 to 40 kms, yet the damage to the green cover was quite unusual as uprooting of trees was reported from nearly 50 places.

 

The immediate and major impact was on the power network in second capital of the State that led to snapping of electric supply due to breaking of overhead wires. The importance of power in daily lives of urban dwellers was never felt so hard as on ThursdayFriday as prolonged power cuts disrupted their lives totally. The daily morning routine for every household is running motor to lift the water from underground sumps. In many localities ofWest Nagpur and South Nagpur, like Central Excise Colony, Surendra Nagar, Ajni, Narendra Nagar and adjoining localities, the non availability of power supply put citizens in a tight spot. The damage to overhead wires due to falling of trees and big branches was so widespread that it took nearly 24 hours for the MSEDCL teams to restore normalcy in the city. For the entire machinery it was quite hectic and right from lineman to Executive Engineer were on streets entire night trying to map out the post damage restoration policy, said Pravin Sthool, Public Relations Officer (PRO). Normally, such disruption in power supply is seen during pre-monsoon time.

 

Yet even during those time, it hardly takes few hours to bring back the system on line. However, this time the damages was quite widespread and even combined efforts of Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) and Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Limited (MSEDCL) proved inadequate to provide immediate relief to citizens. Due to heavy rains, though there was coolness in air and citizens adjusted to it for the time begin as it was night, but in morning the absence of power made lives unbearable for the people. Abhay Kumar, a resident of Deo Nagar, said throughout the night we tried calling every helpline, but that failed to provide any results.

 

Even the app of MSEDCL was not functioning and the helpline number to failed to provide any respite to citizens who never felt so helpless. In fact, at Narendra Nagar sub-station the irate citizens vent their ire and restored to violence, damaging the public property. The area being densely populated, people were fed-up with long hours of power cuts. Though the wind speed of 30 to 40 km is considered normal, yet one was left amazed at the level of destruction of the green cover, it is the pride of heritage of city, is somewhat disturbing. The Fire Brigade was jammed with calls of uprooting of trees and it was mostly concentrated in West Nagpur part where green cover is quite thick.