PESHAWAR: The people of various localities of Badhber on Monday blocked the busy Peshawar-Kohat Road here at Scheme Chowk for over an hour to record their protest against power suspension from the local feeders.

The protesters were seen throwing stones on the road and blocking traffic from both sides that caused immense problems for the commuters.

They shouted full-throttled slogans against State Minister for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali and Wapda for ordering suspension of power supply to their villages. Long queues of vehicles were witnessed while some passengers opted to move on foot towards Peshawar.

The protesters said that power supply had been suspended from the last two days from three feeders of old Badbher, new Badbher and Safan, affecting dozens of villages in the suburbs, including Sulemankhel, Mashokhel, Shaikhan, Shaikh Mohammadi, Masho Gagar, Kaga Wala, Tela Band, Ahmed Khan, Bazidkhel, Surizai and other localities of Mattani area.

`People have been facing prolonged power cuts and about two weeks ago they even staged a sit-in outside the Peshawar Press Club for three days against prolonged loadshedding, but after the visit of Abid Sher Ali the power supply was completely suspended from the local feeders,` a lawyer Arshad Khan told Dawn.

He said that during the sitin the Pesco officials, including executive engineer Akhtar Hameed, had held a meeting with the elders at the office of rural circle SP Raheem Shah where agreement was signed about installation of power metres, clearance of arrears and removal of illegal connections.

`We have been waiting for the Pesco officials to come and install power meters, but they instead suspended the power supply,` Mr Khan said.

He said that people had been facing acute shortage of water and fetching drinking water from far-off tube wells.

He said that the protestors dispersed peacefully on the intervention of some leaders of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf.

He said that the Pesco officials were habitual `corrupt` who had been taking bribes from the people and encouraging them to get illegal connections.