LAHORE - The people are becoming patients of hysteria after spending sleepless nights and irksome days due to unannounced 12 to 14 hours per day power outage as mercury touched 40 Degree Celsius on Sunday here in the City. The worst power outage led to water shortage in various parts of the City on Sunday despite pubic holiday, which multiplied the miseries of the people. The Lahore Electric Supply Company (LESCO) has resorted to unscheduled loadshedding, which is badly affecting the routine life besides damaging the business activities across the City. Long duration loadshedding has made peoples lives tough and miserable as none could manage the household problems particularly during long spell of power outage in scorching heat. More interestingly the LESCO officials at inquiry service, were left with no other option but to stop attending telephone calls after they failed to satisfy its consumers regarding the power breakdown. After waiting for two hours, I made a call at LESCO inquiry office at 2:00 pm to know when the electricity will resume. They replied that within ten minutes. Again after 30 minutes I called at the inquiry service and they were of the view that after one hour the electricity will resume, Ahmed Khan, a resident of Township said. He further said that frequent power breakdowns have become order of the day in that locality as no one was there to pay heed to repeated requests of the LESCO consumers. We have been facing acute problems due to worst load shedding. Besides disturbing our routine life, the load shedding is making people patients of hysteria, Samina Bibi a housewife from Iqbal Town said. Muhammad Usman, a student, said that the electricity breakdown unleashed by the LESCO had caused disturbance in public life, which in fact, he added, has badly affected the abilities and working capabilities of the common man and students as well. We could not sleep at night properly due to frequent midnight power breakdowns, he maintained. Abdul Islam, a schoolteacher, was of the view that the government instead to unleash long time load shedding should make comprehensive strategy for enhancement of power resources by constructing dams and starting hydle power generation projects to increase power production capacity and to get rid of load shedding once for all. I could not even press my clothes in one turn as light played hide and seek the whole day, Mumtaz Ali, a government employee said. Often I have to wear un-press clothes due to load shedding, he added. Mohammad Akram, a CNG station employee, said that he had to tolerate the harsh words of vehicle owners when he had to refuse to fill their tanks during load shedding. Loadshedding for 12 to 14 hours is continued in the City while some areas are facing severe shortage of water as the WASA workers are unable to run tubewells during load shedding. It is worth mentioning here that the Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO) had claimed that the present power shortfall would be reduced from April 1st when the enhanced water releases from Mangla and Tarbela would help cut the duration of load shedding. But the situation on ground is altogether different. The electricity shortage, which is likely to shoot up in the coming days due to high demand during hot and humid weather, would make the peoples lives more miserable. Not enough, the PPP-led government has abolished subsidy and increased the electricity tariff to a considerable extend but still has badly failed to overcome energy shortage. A number of people belonged to different walks of life, have demanded the PPP-led government to take concrete measures to overcome the energy crisis. When contacted repeatedly, DG PEPCO Tahir Basharat Cheema was not available for his comments.