Bhubaneswar: Activists of the student wing of Odisha Congress staged a demonstration in front of the official residence of Energy Minister Pratap Keshari Deb in Bhubaneswar on Monday protesting frequent power outages across the state.
Raising slogans against the Deb, a large number of student Congress activists and leaders gathered outside his residence holding lanterns and hand fans to protest erratic power supply throughout the state. The demonstrators also hurled tomatoes at the residence of the Minister, accusing him of having miserably failed to discharge his duty.
Demanding resignation of the Minister over the issue, the demonstrators lashed out at Deb accusing him of being responsible for making life miserable for the people due to frequent disruptions in power supply.
The Minister should resign forthwith as he has failed to ensure uninterrupted power supply in the state, they claimed, and alleged that Deb has failed to instruct Tata Power clearly to safeguard the interests of the consumers, particularly during summer.
The protesters blamed the Minister for the erratic power supply by the distribution companies and said it was ridiculous on the part of Deb to claim about surplus power in the state. Availability of abundant power is of no use if the government fails to provide electricity to the people when they need it most, they said.
Deb should be removed from the council of Ministers by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for his ‘poor performance’, claimed a protester, citing the recent ouster of a Minister on similar ground.
The demonstrators tried to barge in by scaling the gate of the Minister’s residence, but they were prevented by the police personnel deployed at the site.
The protesters stated that the Minister himself has admitted that power supply is getting disrupted in different places due to weak infrastructure and technical glitches. They sought to know as to what the state government has done during the last 23 years to strengthen power infrastructure.
