JAMMU: Continuing protests against failure of the PDP-BJP government in maintaining regulated power and drinking water supply in Jammu Division, National Conference on Thursday staged a Dharna outside Press Club here and demanded additional power procurement from Northern Grid to combat the crisis like situation region.
“The insensitive and anti-people government has turned a blind eye to power and water crisis in the winter capital and its peripheries”, NC leaders said.
They decried callousness of the government to inflict miseries to the residents and said neither any minister nor any senior officer has taken time out from their cool Valley environs to visit Jammu and fix responsibility of those who have been taking sadistic pleasure in putting people to miseries.
“The people have a right to know why power cuts remain enforced for longer durations and even for entire nights in various areas”, they said and wondered why no exigency plan had been worked out in advance to meet summer exigencies. He said the people have been pushed to wall in the scorching heat with mercury rising each passing day.
Protesters complained that apart from pesky power outage and unscheduled cuts, almost entire Jammu is facing alarmingly heavy voltage fluctuations, resulting in massive damage to electronic gadgets like televisions, inverters, refrigerators and air-conditioners.
“The government must compensate these damages”, they said, adding certain areas were reeling under acute power and water scarcity. This, they said, was happening due to lack of will and vision of the rudderless government that has led to administrative failure.
They cautioned the government not to test patience of people and come out with a blue print on steps to meet the gravest ever situation on power and water fronts.
While hoping that additional power will be procured from neighbouring states, protesters demanded tanker services to the areas which have been witnessing dry taps for days together.
Prominent among those who participated in the protests included Satwant Kour Dogra, Ch Haroon, Anil Dhar, Pradeep Bali, Abdul Gani Teli, S S Bunty, Rakesh Singh Raka, K.D Singh, Dr Tara Chand, Dilsha Malik, Rekha Manhas, Anju Grover, Ravi Dogra, Ashok Singh Manhas, Subash Bhagat, Ashok Dogra, Rohit Bali, Vivek Gupta, Choudhry Akhter, Sanjay Gupta, Sucha Singh, Shabir Ahmed, Gurnam Singh, Anil Sharma, Vijay Gupta, Dalbir Singh, D.S Khurana and Nirmal Singh.