1,117 electricity connections disconnected in Kashmir as noose tightened on ‘erring’ consumers

STATE TIMES NEWS

Srinagar: Tightening the noose on consumers indulging in direct hooking from the power line, violation of the agreed load and bypassing the electricity metres, the authorities in Kashmir have disconnected 1,117 connections, an official spokesman said on Saturday.
The authorities realised a revenue of more than Rs 29 crore in the last four days, the spokesman added.
In order to provide relief to genuine consumers, the Kashmir Power Distribution Corporation Limited (KPDCL) has escalated its night patrolling and inspection drives to tighten noose on “erring” consumers who indulge in widespread hooking, violation of the agreed load and bypassing of the metres, the spokesman said.
The KPDCL collected a revenue of Rs 29.89 crore from consumers over the last four days amidst scaled-up drives to check energy pilferage that primarily results in outages and damage to transformers, thus bringing hardships to genuine consumers, he said.
A revenue of Rs 9.18 crore as pending arrear dues were collected on Friday alone by the corporation.
The spokesperson said out of 1,153 inspections carried out in the Kashmir Division, 331 were conducted in Srinagar, 367 in Ganderbal, 140 in Pulwama, 142 in Bijbehara and 154 in Sopore.
Around 228 kW load was added across these six circles of the corporation during these drives, the spokesman further said.
A penalty of Rs 7.81 lakh was also imposed for unauthorised use of electricity according to Section 126 of the Electricity Act. The spokesperson said 1,117 electricity connections were disconnected for non-payment of energy dues for more than three months. This includes 886 domestic, 212 commercial and 17 industrial consumers.