Big damage to power infrastructure, outages causes frustration

Bescom officials said 294 electricity poles were damaged on Tuesday

The sudden downpour since Tuesday has not only caused deaths, inundation, and brought down trees and branches, but also damaged power infrastructure in the city. The Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (Bescom) had its task cut out as it continued to pour on Wednesday.

Bescom officials said as many as 294 electricity poles were damaged across its jurisdiction on Tuesday. In around five instances, transformers were damaged. Most complaints came from south Bengaluru, an official said.

On Wednesday, 15 poles fell while 21 tree branches fell on power lines, mostly in north Bengaluru.

The resultant power outages have been leaving consumers at their wits’ end.

Harish (name changed), a vegetable shop owner in Vigyan Nagar in east Bengaluru, was trying his best to adjust the emergency light to help both customers shopping as well as himself at the cash counter. “It has been four hours since the power went off. We learnt that a JCB (deployed for road work in the area) damaged a power line,” he said on Wednesday.

Some took to social media to complain or seek help from Bescom. One Twitter user said: “Rain rain go away, otherwise Bescom will cut power whole day.”

Bescom officials said the helpline staff was receiving a huge number of calls and was trying to attend to them. “For monsoon preparedness, tree branch trimming and line maintenance have been done. But when trees are uprooted or branches fall on power lines due to heavy rain, it cannot be pre-empted. If people are unable to register their complaints through the helpline or existing grievance channels, they can reach out to the jurisdictional engineers,” said an official.