Chandigarh Tribune: Ludhiana: Monday,
September 05, 2016.
Punjab State
Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) is under fire from the audit for poor
recovery from consumers indulging in power theft or having unauthorised
additional load. During the financial years 2013-14 and 2014-15, the operations
and enforcements wings of the power utility detected a leakage of revenue to
the extent of Rs 14.73 crore, of which an amount of Rs 12.01 crore was
recovered during this period while Rs 2.72 crore was still outstanding against
the defaulting consumers.
Copies of the
audit report of City Central, Focal Point, Sunder Nagar and the CMC divisions
falling under the City East Circle for the financial years 2013-14 and 2014-15,
obtained under the Right to Information Act by Rohit Sabharwal, president,
Council of RTI Activists, revealed that during the period under review, the
enforcement and operation wings of the power utility had checked a total of
86,808 power connections, of which theft/ unauthorised load was detected in
11,383 cases.
The audit
report further observed that the total leakage of revenue in these cases was to
the tune of Rs 1,472.99 lakh, and the PSPCL was able to recover a sum of Rs
1,200.99 lakh leaving an unrecovered amount of Rs 272 lakh.
Putting a big
question mark on the whole exercise (of checking, imposing penalty and
recovery), the auditors commented: “In order to curb the tendency (of theft and
having unauthorised connected load) on the part of consumers and plug the
leakage of revenue, the enforcement and operations wings of the PSPCL
periodically check the connections of the consumers. However, the effectiveness
of such exercise depends on the amount of recovery made against the theft
detected.”
In the
concluding remarks, the audit team asked the PSPCL officials to explain the
reasons for the non-recovery of the penalty imposed on defaulting consumers
along with the steps (taken or proposed to be taken) to recover the amount from
persons concerned.
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