A transformer located opposite Palace Gate and adjacent to Hapta Kangjeibung in Imphal East, one of the main venues of the Sangai Festival 2022, caught fire on Tuesday night even as the celebration was under way, sending some of the stalls into total darkness.
According to reports, the fire broke out at around 7:45 pm. Police personnel, who were on duty for the festival near the transformer, went into immediate action and extinguished the fire with the help of four-five fire extinguisher cylinders.
There was power outage at the stalls inside Hapta Kangjeibung as the transformer caught fire. However, no casualties were reported.
Later, executive director Hijam Shantikumar, who is also chief engineer of the Power department, and executive engineer concerned came to the spot to fix the issue.
Shantikumar told the media that there is no fault in the electric transformer but that the fire broke out due to imbalance in power consumption from the transformer inside the Sangai Festival venue. He said the transformer provides three phases and there were some faults while transferring the power supply as a huge load of power was found provided from a single phase.
The PWD officials are sorting out the matter inside Hapta Kangjeibung, he added.
Although the fire broke out, cultural programmes in connection with Sangai Festival continued at Bheigyachandra Open Air Theatre. Governor, La Ganesan; Chief Minister N Biren Singh and other MLAs attended the function.
