By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, May 11: The power crisis in the state is going from bad to worse with each passing day with the Meghalaya Energy Corporation Limited (MeECL) now resorting to load-shedding of ten hours in entire state except for Shillong and Tura where the power cuts have been fixed at eight hours.
In Shillong, the schedule of power cuts is: 12 am (midnight) to 5 am; 10 am to 11 am and 1 pm to 3 pm while in Tura the load-shedding timings have been fixed as: 11 pm to 2 am; 4 am to 7 am and 3 pm to 5 pm.
The schedule of load-shedding in other parts of Khasi Hills is: 12 am (midnight) to 4 am; 7 am to 9 am; 11 am to 1 pm; 4 pm to 5 pm and 9 pm to 10 pm.
In Garo Hills, the load-shedding will be effective from 11 pm to 2 am; 4 am to 7 am; 10 am to 11 am and 2 pm to 5 pm.
Chairman-cum-Managing Director of MeECL, Sanjay Goyal said on Thursday that the duration of the load-shedding has not been increased and it remains the same with eight hours of power cuts for Shillong and Tura and 10 hours for the rest of the state. Despite facing one of its worst-ever power crisis, there seems to be no respite in sight for residents of the state.
Power Minister AT Mondal has already made it clear that until the state gets a good amount of rainfall in the coming days and weeks, load-shedding will continue.
Meanwhile, criticising the state government for burdening the citizens with long hours of power cuts, the Meghalaya Trinamool Congress has asked the government to announce a rebate in the power bills.
“The government has lost control of the Power department since the problem have gone from bad to worse considering the government is only looking at the skies and rain gods to solve the problems that they have put themselves into over the past five years,” TMC vice president George B Lyngdoh said on Thursday.
Stating that this exposes the lack of vision and preparedness of the MDA 2.0 Government, Lyngdoh said, “This entire power fiasco is causing a huge economic loss to the state, the entrepreneurs and businesses and the question now is will the government bear the losses of the people,” he said.