Nagpur: Infrastructure agencies and their contractors are frequently damaging power cables in city causing breakdowns. What is more, they are also refusing to pay for the damage. Some power cables have been damaged in so many places that they need replacement but there is no money to do it. Common citizens are suffering due to this.A source in power franchisee SNDL said agencies like National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC), MahaMetro, OCW, etc had damaged power cables 180 times in past 14 months and caused a loss of Rs 5.84 crore to it.“The 11 KV Jafar Nagar feeder was damaged eight times due to which it suffered breakdowns 34 times. The patch up work done at the damaged spot frequently develops fault. While the agency that caused the damage paid for repair eight times, we had to foot the bill for for remaining 26 breakdowns. We also have to face the ire of consumers,” said the source.NHAI is the biggest culprit having caused 41 damages followed by NMC that did 39 times. OCW comes next with 21 damages and MahaMetro fourth highest with 17 damages. Among the private agencies, Reliance Jio has damaged cables 13 times while L&T has done it 10 times.SNDL had asked all these agencies to pay for the damage but all of them refused. The franchisee is contemplating sending legal notices to them for recovering the amount.The infrastructure agencies are defiant. Reliance Jio had refused to pay up through a letter to SNDL. The telecom player stated that it had obtained permission from NMC for excavation and followed the prescribed procedure. Hence it would not pay.NHAI regional officer M Chandrashekhar said SNDL did not provide power cable maps to road contractors. “They don’t know the location of their cables. Road work is going to continue and SNDL should safeguard its property,” he told TOI.OCW spokesperson Sachin Dravekar said that no agency deliberately damaged power cables. “Our pipelines were also damaged over 60 times in past one year but we did not make an issue out of it. Due to SNDL breakdowns power supply to our water treatment plants (WTP) has been disrupted and caused us revenue loss. We didn’t seek compensation for it,” he added.

Stay updated with all the Latest Nagpur headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.