Over 12,000 cases of power theft detected

Chandigarh, Apr 9: The Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam has disconnected supply of 2,80,816 non payers and detected 12,943 cases of theft of power during the year 2007-08.

A spokesman said here today that as many as 57,877 disconnections had been made in Operation Circle Ambala comprising Ambala and Panchkula districts, 54,923 in Yamunanagar, 48,094 in Kurukshetra comprising Kurukshetra and Kaithal districts, 32,088 in Karnal, 30,173 in Panipat, 21,441 in Jind, 16,163 in Rohtak, 14,633 in Sonipat and 5,424 in the newly created Jhajjar Operation Circle.

He said that the Nigam had to recover Rs 224.74 crore from these non-payers out of which Rs 106 crore had been recovered.

"Instructions have been issued to the field offices to ensure that the supply of the non payer is not restored before 24 hours on depositing the payment, strictly as per Haryana Electricity Regulatory Commission order," he said.

He further stated that the Nigam had imposed penalty of Rs 13.52 crore on the consumers involved in theft of power out of which Rs 6.64 crore had been recovered.

"As the theft of power is the main reason for loss of revenue and line losses, the Nigam would go hard with cases pertaining to theft of power," he said.

UNI