MEPCO Mailsi ladders rust as safety lags

MAILSI:

Safety conditions in the MEPCO Division Mailsi have deteriorated sharply as government-issued protective ladders provided to field staff have become dangerously damaged, rotten, and largely unusable.

As a result, line workers are being forced to carry out high-risk field operations using substandard wooden ladders, effectively putting their lives on the line every day.

According to sources, nearly half of the official safety ladders available across all four sub-divisions, City First, City Second, Sardar Pur Jhandir, and Tibba Sultanpur, are completely unfit for use due to severe decay, breakage, and poor maintenance.

Despite being fully aware of the alarming situation, officers have taken no meaningful steps to address it, leaving line staff to perform routine repair work, power restoration, and daily operations under hazardous conditions.

Field sources reveal that although significant funds are spent every two to three months on safety seminars and training sessions, the provision of essential protective equipment in the field continues to be ignored. Workers, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that due to the long-standing non-availability of durable safety ladders, they are compelled to climb electricity poles and installations using weak, risky wooden ladders. They warned that these ladders are so fragile they could lead to a major accident at any moment.

Despite this, senior officers, particularly those in the Vehari Circle, have not taken practical steps to resolve the issue.

Verified sources further disclosed that returning old or defective ladders to the store under the official procedure (MRN) has become extremely complicated and time-consuming. Because of this overly complex process, broken and worn-out ladders have never been returned to the store for years.

If these unusable ladders had been formally returned on time, the field staff could have received new replacements, preventing unnecessary delays and reducing the risk to workers' lives.

Workers fear that if the current situation continues, a serious accident is inevitable. They have appealed to the MEPCO Chief Executive Officer and other senior officials to take urgent and effective measures to safeguard the lives of the line staff, who work tirelessly around the clock to keep the power supply system running.