Lucknow: In a scene straight out of a satire, actor Sujata Singh an actress who have worked with Amitabh Bachchan in landed up at Lucknow Development Authority’s Citizens’ Grievance Day, not for a role, but to request a basic amenity: electricity.
“I’ve done 25 films,” she told stunned officials, “worked with Amitabh, Abhishek, Manoj Bajpayee, Richa Chadha, Hrithik Roshan and I still don’t have a power connection in Lucknow for four years!” Despite her appearances in Mirzapur-2, Vikram Vedha, and a recent devotional series with Arun Govil, her real-life drama has no audience. “There’s a connection in the village, but not in the city. Why? What has the city got against light?” she said with a sigh. She and her husband run a shop in Yahiyaganj, but their shop’s power application seems lost in a bureaucratic black hole.
Meanwhile, another man arrived with a complaint on behalf of his disabled mother. “She’s been living in the dark,” he pleaded. Commissioner Roshan Jacob, unfazed, said, “Aaiye baithiye, sunte hain.”.
From uprooted meters to smoky parks where people allegedly perform last rites, grievances poured in like monsoon rain. One complainant even claimed smoke from the park near his house makes cooking impossible for three days.
After hearing that a man’s mother had been in darkness for three years, officials finally relented ordering a new meter and bill payments in installments. In the city of Nawabs, it seems electricity remains more elusive than a Bollywood break.
