J&K Chief Secretary ordered to ensure regular power supply to High Court

Jammu, February 19

“Pathetic and unbelievable” —These are the words of High Court of J&K and Ladakh over power failure during court hearing in Srinagar on Monday. With power shutdown, there was no light or air heating unit functional at the court which made Justice Moksha Khajuria Kazmi and Justice Atul Sreedharan to ask the Chief Secretary of J&K Atal Dulloo to act on the matter.

Expressing dismay over power failure, the court issued an order which stated that during the court hours, High Court suffered a complete power failure. “The generator is also not working. There are no lights. The air heating unit is also not functional. It is pathetic and unbelievable that this is the condition of Srinagar Wing of the High Court of J&K and Ladakh,” read an order.

The power failure took place at around 9.45 am and was not restored till 11.28 am when the order was passed. “The matter has gone from bad to worse,” the order read.

“A permanent solution that is required. This court requests the Chief Secretary of the UT to pass necessary orders to solve this problem forthwith. The solution may vary from having a separate power line to the High Court which does not experience any downtime and also supported by generators of such capacity which can power the entire High Court and also the air heating unit without interruption in the event of the dedicated power supply to the High Court fails,” the order read.

The order has come as a major embarrassment for the J&K administration with locals in both Kashmir and Jammu facing regular power shutdowns despite claims of authorities that power scenario was improving.