Bathinda, August 31
History of sorts will be created at midnight tonight when the town-known as the heartland of the Malwa region will become the first free from power cuts.

With the efforts of the local MLA and Punjab Science and Technology Minister, Mr Chiranji Lal Garg, the decision to make Bathinda town free from power cuts was taken when Punjab Chief Minister, Parkash Singh Badal visited here on August 12 to hold a series of ‘sangat darshan’ functions.

Mr Badal then promised residents that the town would be made free from power cuts soon and urged the Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB) authorities to make arrangements at the earliest.

Mr Garg said no new arrangements for the supplying of extra and additional power supply to the city had been made. He added that only the urban feeders supplying power within the municipal limits of city and some surrounding areas had been ensured regular supply.

The citizens for the past many years have been raising this demand by claiming that they have to bear the pollution being caused by the fly ash being emitted by the chimneys of the local Guru Nanak Dev Thermal Plant and thus have been suffering from various respiratory and eye ailments.

They have been pleading with the successive governments that at least they should be compensated by giving regular power supply.

For the past many years, the city has been facing unscheduled and unannounced power cuts frequently. Subsequently-generator and invertor making industry mushroomed.

The PSEB sources said, from now onward, there would be no power cut in the residential, commercial area and in those areas where the small scale industry was located in the city.