Haryana: Electricity bill defaulters taken to task by govt;crores recovered via Tehsildar
Suspense Crime, Digital Desk : The Electricity Corporation has initiated a strict measure to take up cases of huge defaulting on the electricity bills, under the direction of the Union Minister for energy, Mr Manohar Lal and the state's minister for energy, Mr Anil Vij. Customers having more than Rs 1 lac as pending electricity bill shall be charged under Land Revenue Act. If necessary the property will also be forfeited.
150 cases have already been prepared and forwarded to the tehsildars of respective circles in Panipat and around 7000 users are being traced out in the entire district having huge pending electricity bills.
Recovery will be done via Tehsildar
Superintendent engineer, Mr Dharam Suhag, stated that notices have been sent to all big defaulters and 113 of these are sent through the tehsildar for follow up.
Mr Suhag also states that under the Land Revenue Act the govt is empowered to take up the cases for the recovery of the outstanding amounts, and even seize the property if it deems fit.
According to the engineer, a few cases are being heard in the court while seven have been put under stay and the Corporation is about to file for an appeal in the High court to get the cases removed from the list of stay.
48000 consumers defaulters in district
According to the Superintendent engineer, approximately 48,000 consumers in the district are defaulters of electricity bill, and the Electricity Corporation is continuously undertaking recovery measures. The Electricity Corporation states that there has been improvement in the electricity bill recovery rates in Panipat, as compared to earlier, with sometimes the recovery rate reaching more than 100 per cent.
According to the Electricity Corporation officials the strict measures have proved useful as some of the defaulters have already begun to pay their bills after the receipt of notice.
New connection after clearance of old bill
Mr Dharam Suhag explains that the issue often arises where consumers has his connection discontinued or sold his property and moved, then someone else arrives to get a connection on the same place and in order to obtain a new connection, it is compulsory that he first pay the old pending bills.
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