MK feels the heat, gets generator for home

CHENNAI: At last, former Chief Minister M Karunanidhi is feeling the heat that the rest of the residents of the city have been facing, due to the power shortage that the state has been reeling under. On Friday, a huge ele­ctricity generator was seen being installed at his Gopalapuram house, much to the surprise of passers by.While the installation was in progress even in the evening, the generator will soon help the DMK chief and his family members tide over the impact of the hour long load-shedding, which takes place now between 10 and 11 am in the Gopalapuram area.Till recently, even when the entire state was enduring power shutdowns, Karunanidhi’s house continued to have uninterrup­ted power supply. According to some residents, power cuts in Gopalap­uram started only some time after the DMK lost power.It is said that, earlier, if there was a power cut in the locality where Karunanidhi is staying, a power cable linking another area would be connected to the house line.However, Gopalapuram became like any other area in the city which is subject to the mandatory one-hour power cut every day. Karunanidhi had been living in the house in Gopala­puram even before the DMK came to power in Tamil Na­du in 1967. Even after he became the Chief Minister for the first time in 1969, he continued to live in the same house. Though later he started dividing his time between his homes in Gopalapuram and CIT colony (which was earlier in Oliver Road), Gopalapuram is his official residence, drawing a stream of visitors daily. Perhaps the impact of the regular load-shedding was affecting his work at home, and necessitated for the first time, a generator.