HC closes power failure issue

Srinagar, Feb 22: The High Court of J&K and Ladakh closed the issue of power and heating system failure that hampered working in its Srinagar wing on February 19.

On February 19, the court during the hearing of a case had taken serious note of the power and heating system failure and urged the government to solve the problem perennially.

“The issue raised by the previous order dated February 19 stands closed,” a division bench of Justice Atul Sreedharan and Justice Moksha Khajuria Kazmi said in its order after authorities’ assurance.

The order came in the wake of a meeting of the Chief Engineer of the PW(R&B) Department, Sajad Ahmad Naqeeb, with the court.

“During the meeting, the reason of a total black-out in the HC premises was revealed to be due to abrupt break-down of the 250 KVA generator due to overloading as the other generator 320 KVA was still undergoing maintenance for two months,” the bench said.

It said: “We express our concern that the period of maintenance was excessively long and that responsibility must be affixed within the organisation.”

The court said that the Chief Engineer, Naqeeb also assured that he would look into the matter and “ensure that the HC would never have power cuts of this duration again and that if need be, the department would hire a 320 KVA generator as a standby to ensure seamless power during power-cuts.”

The court said that given the assurance given by the Chief Engineer, it was satisfied that no further action needed to be taken in this case and closed the order dated February 19.