Telangana: Power staff bear the brunt of power outages

The management is reportedly taking action against the Additional Assistant Engineer (AEE) of Nagaram as well for a similar disruption in power supply.

Hyderabad: Amid criticism from opposition parties and people in general over incidents of frequent power disruption across the State, managements of State-run power utilities have reportedly started taking action against their staff for power disruptions in their jurisdictions.

On Saturday, Southern Power Distribution Company of Telangana Limited (TSSPDCL) Chairman and Managing Director Musharraf Farooqui suspended the Habsiguda circle divisional engineer following a 30 minute power outage in the area.

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The management is reportedly taking action against the Additional Assistant Engineer (AEE) of Nagaram as well for a similar disruption in power supply.

The CMD reportedly took action against the officials as a video showing a brief power outage interrupting former Minister Ch Malla Reddy’s speech during a poll meeting in the Nagaram area went viral on social media platforms. The CMD asked the Superintendent Engineer and Chief General Manager to submit a report after the matter came to the notice of the corporate office.

Recently, Leader of Opposition and BRS president K Chandrashekhar Rao said there were frequent power cuts in Mahabubnagar during his visit to former minister V Srinivas Goud’s house. However, TSSPDCL authorities denied that there were power cuts during the former Chief Minister’s visit to Mahabubnagar and even issued a statement claiming that reports with regard to power outages were false and misleading.

In the past too, several incidents of power outages came to light, but every time the State government denied that there was a shortage of power in the State.

In fact, Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy had warned officials over power outages and even claimed that some of the field-level staff, who were appointed during the previous government’s tenure, were deliberately imposing power cuts to malign the government.

Meanwhile, power officials claimed that the Opposition was putting pressure on power employees who were doing their work in a challenging atmosphere.

“The unprecedented surge in power demand has put immense pressure on the system. There is no shortage of power in the State. We are making efforts to meet the increased demand,” an official said.

The managements of the State-run power utilities are reportedly initiating action against officials for power outages in their respective jurisdiction.

This is putting a lot of pressure on the power staff and affecting their work. Ever since the Congress party came to power in the State, it has been facing criticism for not being able to provide uninterrupted power supply.

The State is witnessing frequent power cuts, especially in the rural areas, since the last four months. There were also reports on a large number of agriculture pump sets getting damaged due to power fluctuation.