April 22: After being reprimanded by the Madras High court, officials of the Ooty municipality and the electricity department swung into action on Thursday to begin disconnecting water and power connections of unauthorised constructions in the Nilgiris. Nilgiris collector Archana Patnaik said instructions had been given to the municipality as well as the electricity department to execute the high court directions and that they had commenced work Thursday morning. Municipal staff also demolished an unauthorised construction at the Walshaam Road area here.

Municipal engineer Mr Ramamoorthy said that the field staff had been given the list of connections to be cut and they were carrying out that work area wise. He added that the work might take some more time to complete.

TNEB assistant engineer Sivakumar confirmed that for the first phase, the municipal administration had handed over a list of 182 unauthorised constructions to which power would have to be cut. Electricity board workers have just started snapping te power supply, he added. Environmentalists want the district administration to monitor the disconnection work being carried out by the municipal officials to ensure that they are taking action against all unauthorised constructions.