Sumbal, April 05: Dangling electric wires tied with trees and worn-out wooden poles are posing grave threat to the lives of people as well as to their property in Zalpora Sumbal village od Sonawari in north Kashmir’s Bandipora districtm besides people are facing acute power shortage due to deterioration of the transmission infrastructure.
The residents Zalpora Sumbal allege that they are living under constant fear due to low lying electric wires tied with trees in their villages and the electric wires have been tied with trees and decaying electric poles. The wires are decayed and fall in jiffy due to winds.
“Ironically, PDD department claims that electricity reaches to all but as a consumers we have to pay for electric wires and other related things. See the wires are tied with poplar and mulberry trees. As wind blows the electricity system remains affected for weeks together,” said Tahir Hussain, a local.
“The electric lines touch roofs of houses and trees on roads posing risk to life and property. Due to low-lying overhead transmission lines, we are not able to work properly in the fields. There have been many incidents of people getting injured after coming in contact with these power lines here,” said another local Abdul Rashid said.
The locals said that despite repeated pleas before the concerned authorities, no action has been taken.
“PDD department didn’t deliver bills from last one year and villagers couldn’t pay their bills. Now the department has sent bills with interests that have shocked us all as it was fault of department,” they added.
They further alleged that bills were not delivered to them for a year. “The bills were not generated on our names due to which we could not pay the bills on due dates,” they added.
“We requested PDD officials to replace dangling and damaged electric wires, the decayed makeshift poles from the fields and residential areas, but our pleas fell on deaf ears and the problems persist” said the locals.
They said that department is claiming to have spend crores for repair, maintenances and augmentation purposes but in reality it is only on papers whereas ground situation is grim. “The condition of High Tension (HT) transmission lines and Low Tension (LT) lines is going from bad to worse with each passing day.”
When contacted Executive Engineer PDD Sumbal, Sonwari Aftab Ahmad, said that non-availability of funds is hampering the work. “If there are inflated bills I will look into the matter,” added Aftab Ahmed.
