MARGAO: It’s that time of the year when the mercury is at its peak as people look out for a cosy place to cool and relax may be under a fan or in air conditioned room, but the power shutdown on Saturday was like a curse on the residents of the commercial capital.
“We cannot watch television or use computers or laptops as there is no charge left,” complained Mervyn Medeira, a civil engineer working for a government undertaking.
Arguing that cosmopolitan places such as Mumbai cannot afford to have such long shutdowns as it would incur losses in crores of rupees; he opined that a parallel or standby system should be put in place.
The owner of Tato restaurant near Grace Church said, “People should be prepared for such shutdowns which are planned for annual maintenance. “We had stocked the ice-creams and some juices in a cold storage to tide over the shutdown,” he said.
He said they had prepared the required masalas for various dishes well in advance and had no problem whatsoever in serving the delicacies to the people in the morning.
On the other hand, Pankaj Anvekar from Kamat Hotel near MMC garden complained that the ice-creams got spoilt and soft drinks turned warm. “Instead of pleasing my customers, I saw displeasure on their faces,” he lamented.
The youth selling fruit juices or milk shakes were forced to keep their stalls or kiosks closed in the morning.
“There was no point in opening the kiosk as we would have served only soft drinks when our actual sale is on milk shakes and fruit juices,” complained an owner of a juice centre near the old railway station.
Two juice shops located at the old bus stand remained closed in the morning, however two of them including Babus served only lime soda.
However, some juice sellers in the New Market served everything including shakes and falooda as they had a back up in the form of a generator set or inverter. “This is how we earn our money and this is the season to earn so we invested on the inverter,” said a juice seller in the New Market.
