"Pathetic": Jammu and Kashmir High Court left ‘powerless’ as outage shuts lights, heating system

The Jammu and Kashmir High Court at Srinagar was plunged into darkness on Monday for hours as it suffered a complete power failure, forcing it to take judicial note of same and seek Chief Secretary's intervention [Aaqib Hussain & Ors. V/s University of Kashmir & Ors]..The division bench of Justice Atul Sreedharan and Justice Moksha Khajuria Kazmi recorded that the power failure took place around 9:30 am and the electricity wasn't restored even till 11:28 am when the order was dictated by the Court.The Court termed the situation 'pathetic and unbelievable'."During Court hours, the High Court has suffered a complete power failure. The generator is also not working. There are no lights. The air heating unit (AHU) is also not functional. It is pathetic and unbelievable that this is the condition of Srinagar Wing of the High Court of High Court of J&K and Ladakh," the Court noted. .The Court was hearing a case related to University of Kashmir when it took note of the outage. Pertinently, Jammu and Kashmir faces shortage of electricity during winter months and the power department has to resort to load shedding. Resultantly, it is common for the residents to witness outage. However, the electricity usually remains regular in urban areas like Srinagar, which is the summer capital of Union Territory of J&K..The Court stressed that a permanent solution was required to tackle the situation as far as the Srinagar bench is concerned. It accordingly requested the Chief Secretary of the Union Territory to pass necessary orders to solve the problem forthwith. "The solution may vary from having a separate power line to the High Court which does not experience any downtime and also supported by generators of such capacity which can power the entire High Court and also the air heating unit without interruption in the event of the dedicated power supply to the High Court fails," it suggested. .The Court ordered the listing of the matter on the top of the list on December 21 for the further orders. "A copy of this order be furnished to Chief Secretary of the Union Territory of JK under the seal and signature of Bench Secretary today itself," the order states further.[Read Order]