Power cable theft caused Rs110m loss to KESC

KARACHI - In last one year, the KESC suffered a loss of Rs110 million from the incidents of copper wire theft,Naveed Ismail, CEO of Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) said.
Addressing a Press briefing, he said that not only such negative acts render financial loss to the utility, but caused long suspension of power distribution in these areas, which could be restored only after time-consuming system recovery efforts. This theft has been reported from different areas of the City.
To a question, he said KESC would participate in the present government’s exercise of modernising the Indian Utilities Act of 1910, under which the company had been established by British government in 1913, and the Electricity Rules of 1937, which need revamping to reflect the times.
The law had already been updated in the neighbouring countries according to the needs of fast growing population and industrial growth.
Ismail said that throughout the world, hydropower was considered to be the best electricity source. However, in our country, water pressure was not available throughout year, so, the coal could be another option, which was cheaper than any other means.
He mentioned that there was 0MW loadshedding in the City on Friday, as the total demand was 2,107 MW and the supply was also the same.
He explained that during summer and monsoon season, the utility would provide dedicated technical staff to each town nazim in the metropolis in order to speedily rectify local faults.
Jan Abbas Zaidi, chief operating officer - distribution, informed the media that on June 4 last year, the ‘118’ complaint centre of the KESC had received a total of 48,718 calls, while on the same date this year, calls had dropped to nearly 14,800 which showed a fall in the number of complaints.

The Nation :Published: June 06, 2009