KESC explains legal notice to KCCI members

Last week, the Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) had taken a serious notice of the public maligning campaign against the power utility. And on December 8, KESC issued a legal notice to Mian Abrar and Siraj Kassam Teli, the current and former presidents of Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
KESC demanded via the notice that both the KCCI leaders issue an immediate and unconditional apology, for the defamatory remarks written in letters by them to the Prime Minister and President while ignoring the ground facts and placing the blame on KESC for the power crisis in the city.
In view of the defamatory letters written by the KCCI flag bearers to the highest officiating levels of the country, and engaging in a continuous and sustained media smear campaign against the power utility, KESC issued a legal notice of Rs1 billion to Siraj Teli and Mian Abrar. KESC has stated that the wisdom behind the financial claim of the defamation notice is to use the stated Rs1 billion to purchase fuel for power generation and provide the resultant electricity 'Free of Cost' to the consumers of Karachi.
Ironically after being served the Rs 1 billion defamation notice, in order to gain sympathy from within the KCCI ranks, the KCCI leaders have been trying to garner support of the body's members, by instilling fear and creating a false pretext that KESC's notice has not been served to just the two of them, infact has been served to all the KCCI members, which is hearsay and merely a product of the rumour mill being churned by the smear-campaigners.
On scrutinising the legal notice, it is noted that KESC has also warned the two KCCI presidents to refrain from acting in an illegal manner, since KCCI, represented by Siraj Teli, had along with itself, including KESC and SSGC signed an agreement on November 26, 2011 in the presence of the Governor of Sindh, Ishratul Ibad and Federal Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources, Dr Asim Hussain for gas load management during the peak winter season, articulating clearly that the end to the load shed in the industrial zones of Karachi, would be directly linked to the provision of 180 mmcfd gas to KESC by SSGC. And despite the fact that the power utility has already complied with the relevant provisions on its part, including payment of Rs2 billion to SSGC on November 29, 2011 but till date, SSGC had not been able to deliver the agreed quota of 180 mmcfd as promised to KESC. Interesting enough the gas supply from SSGC to KESC has in fact been dwindling at a dismal level of a mere 100mmcfd.
It is also pointed out in the legal notice that the large industrialists were violating the Government's Gas Allocation Policy, an act which is in fact fuelling the current power crisis. According to a KESC statement, "in order to seriously address the looming power crisis, the government should as a first measure ensure implementation of the gas allocation policy for the Captive Power Producers. Speaking specifically of the captive power producers, it is quite ironic that the most amount of noise is being made from those quarters of the large industrialists, the likes of Siraj Kassam Teli, who are the least affected by the quantum of the load shedding. These are those entities who are using gas to generate in-house cheap electricity for their own consumption (captive power generation), and in other words they use the power supplied by KESC only as a standby."
The legal notice warned that in the event of the failure of these two industrialists to provide an unconditional and full apology within seven days, KESC had provided clear instructions to commence legal proceedings against 'the two' for defamation and damages.
The legal notice stated that the defamatory and offensive remarks made by the two individuals has injured the good name and professional reputation of KESC, which has made innovative and pioneering steps since the present management took over in September, 2008 and has enhanced its generation capacity by 400 MW as well as an additional 560 MW coming online from its Bin Qasim plant, of which 350 MW had already been commissioned. The notice also stated that KESC is a public limited company quoted on the key stock exchanges of the country and forming an important component of the KSE-100 index. It is in fact the first utility company in Pakistan to exempt all major industrial zones from schedule load shedding for the past two and a half years.-PR