The revenue starved Electricity Department, in a public notice issued on Friday, warned consumers to clear pending dues failing which power supply to the premises of defaulters would be disconnected from September 26.
Arrears to an extent of Rs 227.59 crore were pending from both government and private consumers, Superintending Engineer K Madhivanan told Express.
In the low-tension category, Rs 34.76 crore was yet to be paid by the government. Other arrears in the low tension category included Rs 37.15 crore from domestic consumers, Rs 35.32 crore from commercial establishments, Rs 30.97 crore from private industries and Rs 8.49 crore from agricultural consumers.
The total arrears in the high tension category amounted to Rs 80.89 crore out of which the government had to pay Rs 41 crore. In the same category, cases pertaining to arrears amounting up to Rs 12.58 crore were pending in courts while Rs 20.70 crore was referred for recovery under Revenue Recovery Act. Industries that used high tension power were yet to pay Rs 5.74 crore.
There were a total of 4,06,494 consumers in the Union territory, including 3,00,432 domestic consumers, 43,144 commercial consumers, 6,810 agricultural consumers and 49,438 consumers for street lights. Industrial consumer base was formed by 6,210 establishments in the low tension category, 412 in medium tension category and 41 establishments in high tension category. There were seven industries in the high tension category. All these consumers used 2387.6 million units annually.
The annual net revenue requirement of the electricity department was Rs 948.4 crore out of which Rs 682.8 crore was met mainly from tariffs. According to the data received from department sources, the cumulative revenue gap, including the gap from previous years, was Rs 428.4 crore.
The Electricity Department had already raised the tariff twice in less than a year’s time and was also collecting additional charges for the period prior to the revision of tariff.
In view of the financial crunch, the department might crack the whip on private consumers. It, however, remains to be seen as to how it would recover dues from government entities.
Comments
0 comment