Massive power cuts across Delhi; protests held

The national capital on Tuesday reeled under massive power cuts, with outages in some areas lasting for over eight to nine hours, resulting in inconvenience to people in the sweltering heat.

People in certain localities of West Delhi even hit the streets, protesting long power cuts.

The VVIP areas in central Delhi also went without power for more than four hours, which affected functioning of offices.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said the demand for power in various northern states has gone up significantly and the situation was not going to improve till monsoon arrives in the city.

"Yes, naturally it (load shedding) is happening on a large scale...The demand in the northern states has gone up. The problem will remain till monsoon arrives," Dikshit said, exhorting people to limit the consumption of power.

Angry over long outages, people in West Delhi took to the streets, protesting the power cuts.

"There was no power in our area for six hours. Because of power cuts, we could not even fill our water tanks. So imagine the situation," said a protester in Uttam Nagar area.

The maximum power demand was recorded on Tuesday at 5,350 mega watt against Monday's 5,454 mega watt, which was the highest ever power demand in Delhi.

Officials said production of power at the Badarpur Thermal Power Station came down to 510 MW from 633 MW due to shortage of water.

Most of the areas in the city faced power cuts due to technical faults as the distribution networks tripped due to the increasing load on them.