Uttarakhand power outage: Congress MLA cuts supply to power officials’ houses; cites 15 days of unheeded requests

ROORKEE: Frustrated over irregular power supply and prolonged morning power cuts lasting over three hours, Congress MLA from Jhabreda, Virendra Jati, on Tuesday morning reached the official residences of electricity department's superintending engineer and executive engineers in Roorkee and disconnected their power supply.The lawmaker said that for the past 15 days he had repeatedly appealed to electricity department officials to stop rostering during morning hours, as it was causing severe inconvenience to the public.Electricity department officials defended the power cuts, stating that they were compelled to resort to rostering due to power shortages and that the situation was likely to continue.On Tuesday morning, Jati, accompanied by a few supporters carrying a folding ladder and pliers, reached the residences of senior power department officials in Civil Lines area, climbed electricity poles and roofs and personally disconnected electricity supply. The officials targeted included UPCL superintending engineer Vivek Rajput, executive engineer (rural) Vinod Pandey, and executive engineer Anupam Singh of Power Transmission Corporation of Uttarakhand.Addressing the media later, Jati said morning hours are critical. "Children need to go to school, livestock must be given water, and many essential household activities depend on power. The department enforces power cuts between 5 am and 8 am. For the past 15 days, I have been requesting officials to change the rostering schedule, but no one listened," he said. "If the situation does not improve, electricity will be cut at all govt officials' homes," Jati warned.Executive engineer (Rural) Vinod Pandey said: "Due to a shortage of power in winter, we are compelled to resort to morning rostering… Power distribution has to be managed based on the condition of the grid. The situation is unlikely to improve soon."SP (Rural) S C Suyal said, an FIR was registered against Jati and his supporters under various sections of BNS, including Section 333 (house trespass), Section 352 (spreading false information), Section 221 (voluntarily obstructing a public servant in discharge of duty), Section 324(4) (damage to public property) and Section 132 (use of criminal force against a public servant).