MULTAN-State Minister for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali said on Wednesday the country was on path to prosperity but some opposition parties could not digest Pakistan’s progress and are hatching conspiracies to deteriorate the situation.
Talking to the media here, he added that the PML-N government would continue to do its work without getting frightened from the internal and external terrorists. He said that the country would soon become loadshedding-free which would run the wheel of industry, resulting in progress and prosperity.
He said that an indiscriminate country-wide operation had been launched against the defaulters and orders had been issued for the disconnection of the defaulters irrespective of their political or other influences.
He said that work to end power crisis was underway day and night a number of projects to generate electricity through coal, water, gas, sunlight and wind were under construction. He declared that the duration of loadshedding in coming summer would be shorter than the last year’s. He said that a 220-KV Chishtian Grid Station had been inaugurated two days ago and the Rs2.63 billion project stabilised power supply to Chishtian. He said that the grid station would supply electricity to six 132KV grids which would then supply power to Chishtian, Bahawalnagar, Hasilpur, Noorsir, Haroonabad, Dahiranwala and Fort Abbas. He said that the government was determined to end loadshedding and the power distribution infrastructure was upgraded in all the provinces and Kashmir for the purpose.
Giving details of projects, he said that the power supply from Bakhi, Balluki and Haveli Bahadur Shah power plants, Qadirabad Coal Power Plant and Qasim Power Plant would begin. He further revealed that the Multan Electric Power Company completed 22 grid station construction projects at a cost of Rs4.80 billion while another Rs3.88 billion was spent on 33 projects of transmission lines, Rs3.39 billion on augmentation or extension of 109 grid stations.
He revealed that the electrification of 2,700 new villages of South Punjab was done while the recovery ratio of the company during the ongoing year stood at 100 per cent. He said that the company got registered 1,102 cases against power pilferers and imposed fine worth Rs537 million on them.