Ganderbal villages reel under darkness

Ganderbal: Many villages in this Central Kashmir District are reeling under darkness from past few weeks as transformers in their areas have developed some technical snags.
Residents of Kangan area said a transformer in their area has developed some technical snag and their areas have been reeling under darkness for past many days.
Meanwhile locals said that those who have electricity are facing tremendous problems due to low voltage.
A local Youth of Tawheed Pora kangan said: “We are facing immense hardships in presence of this low electricity. Assurances of Power Development Department (PDD) to get a new transformer at the earliest proved to be a hoax as nothing has been done till
date. We youths face a lot of problems when we reach to our tution points in Srinagar (city) as we can’t complete our tasks/homework due to the very low voltage of electricity in the area”.
“I am visiting my cousin’s house to get my laptop charged as they have a transformer there and we pay electricity bill equal in amount”, said an IT student.
He alleged that only 100 volt of electricity is there and they are using candles at dinner time.
A senior citizens of Kangan said that “population is increasing day by day and needs also but the transformers are neither increased nor upgraded, they were installed years back in the area and are still there without any up gradation”. “There is need of few more transformers especialy in winter as here in Kashmir electricity crises arise mostly in winter”, he added.
Kangan was a Tehsil Head Quarter and now it is a sub-district which is within the premises of 3 mega power houses, within 20 km and one of them is in main town Kangan (Jee Sahib Power House) but all for others. Those who provide their land, manpower are without
electricity” a local farmer Ghulam Hassan told The Kashmir Pulse.
Hussain, a local resident alleged that his 1 acre land was used for the power house in early 90’s when it was contructed and a promise to his father was made that their one family member will be provided job in the department and they will get free electricity but neither we got job nor the electricity”.
Residents of Parray mohalla, Wayil area blocked Srinagar Leh National Highway for hours. They alleged that PDD department is forcing them to come on roads as they are without electricity from days.
The inhabitants of Kangan said that their transformer often develops technical snag and every time PDD officials took money from us to get the transformer repaired. They alleged that PDD employees are responsible for these snags as they don’t know how to maintain the usage of transformers.
People of Kangan and its adjoining  areas like Wayil, Surfraw etc are without electricity from past few days.

Beigh Irshad
Beigh Irshad is a Kashmir based freelance journalist
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