Villagers protest outage, confine meter readers

People of several villages at Madhupur upazila of the district yesterday protested power outage and confined two meter readers of Palli Bidyut Samity in Moter Bazar area.

A police team later rescued the meter readers --Abdur Razzak and Abul Hossain--and took them to Madhupur Police Station, said Officer-in-Charge (OC) Mohammad Shafiqul Islam.

On April 16, people of Aushnara, Lainepara, Chuniapara, Ikuriapara, Shahpara, Holudia blocked Tangail-Mymensingh Road in Gangair area for an hour alleging that the Palli Bidyut customers in the areas were not getting electricity supply for more than three to four hours in 24 hours for the last two months.

Though they withdrew the programme on that day on assurance of the authorities concerned, they told the meter readers in the area not to make bills until the electricity supply returned to normal in the areas.

They also threatened to launch a tougher agitation programme if the electricity supply was not made normal within the next 24 hours.

Contacted, Mohammad Abul Kalam Azad, deputy general manager of Madhupur zonal office of Mymensingh Palli Bidyut Samily-1, said they are getting seven MW to nine MW electricity from the 33KV Line against the demand for 26 MW for Madhupur, Dhanbari and Gopalpur upazilas.