NAVVNEET DUBEY
Jammu: Nearly 10 percent of around one lakh streetlights installed in 75 wards of the city by the Municipal Corporation are out of order.
The company is not paying any heed to repair those and Jammu Municipal Corporation’s electrical wing is under pressure from officials and the public.
As a result of this, the corporation’s electrical wing is singlehandedly repairing the defunct streetlights in the city. Each ward has 40-50 out-of-order lights which are beyond repair. The staff is only repairing the lights which can be fixed. Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) has the contract for streetlights in Jammu city.
The damaged lights have to be replaced and the company has assured to replace the damaged ones as soon as the new lights arrive. The company has assured that the damaged lights have to be replaced and replace the damaged ones as soon as the new lights arrive. In this regard on Tuesday, a team from the Jammu Municipal Corporation and the company launched a campaign to repair faulty streetlights in Shastri Nagar, Ward No. 22. Nearly two dozen streetlights were repaired.
Previously, work was done to repair faulty streetlights in Bakshi Nagar, Rajpura, and Trikuta Nagar. Despite this, many streetlights remain out of order in the city’s wards. Corporation officials say that as per the roster, repair of faulty street lights continues on a routine basis in every ward.
Nodal officer of the electrical wing, said that every day, the corporation’s team is busy working in one ward or another. All faulty streetlights are being repaired in a phased manner. Only a few lights are out of order now. These will be fixed in the next few days. Other minor work continues concurrently. A new helpline number has been issued for streetlight repairs. People can now register their complaints by calling this helpline number: 9240268676. Many streetlights are out of order, forcing people to contact the helpline number. Municipal Corporation has also provided a toll-free number of 18001809207.
City residents can also file complaints online at support.eeslindia.org. Complaints can be filed on the new number from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. The Municipal Corporation signed an agreement with the central government company Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) in August 2019. Following this, the company began installing streetlights in the city.
By March 2024, more than 100,000 streetlights had been installed in 75 wards of the city. Furthermore, the company was supposed to set up a control room from which each streetlight, but that could not be established.
