ISLAMABAD: The Natio­nal Assembly’s Standing Committee on Water and Power saw a tug of war on Wednesday between the official machinery operating the power sector and the elected representatives of Sindh — with each side accusing the other of not cooperating to streamline the system.

Mohammad Arshad Khan Leghari, who heads the committee, highlighted some consumer grievances and decried overbilling by electricity distribution companies (Discos).

The committee adopted a report prepared by its sub-committee on “the performance of Discos of Sindh” and expressed concern over the “non-cooperative attitude” of the Hyderabad Elec­tric Supply Company (Hesco) and the Sukkur Electric Power Company (Sepco).

The NA body directed the water and power ministry to address the issues identified by the sub-committee and submit a compliance report within 15 days.

The committee constituted another sub-committee to address issues pertaining to Hesco and Sepco. The body will be headed by Nawab Muhammad Yousuf Talpur while other members will be Ghulam Mustafa Shah, Syed Kazim Ali Shah and Syed Muhammad Waseem.

Representatives of the two companies alleged that a number of parliamentarians were involved in electricity theft, but stopped short of naming them.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Sepco, Mujahid Islam, said there were almost 400 ‘kunda’ connections at each transformer within his jurisdiction while in certain areas the number of consumers who pay their electricity bills averages between 10 and 15 per transformer.

“If a transformer gets da­maged or burned off in any such area, it is not replaced,” Mujahid Islam said. “Just before Eid one elected representative assured us that payments will be made if we replace the damaged transformer, but payment has yet to be made.”

According to the CEO, 17,000 kunda connections have been identified and offers made to the people concerned to get meters installed, but only 400 of them had responded to the offer so far.

“The real issue is that our employees are colluding in electricity theft with these kunda consumers. We are in a dilemma: if action is taken against employees, we face political pressures in support of employees. But if employees are not checked, the kunda system will remain uncontrolled,” he added.

Cases against two sub-divisional officers have been referred to the National Accountability Bureau while four executive engineers have been suspended on charges of facilitating electricity theft.

Giving the statistics of Sepco, he said there were 700,000 consumers a few months ago, but the number had come down to 550,000 after a crackdown on illegal connections.

However, 375,000 out of the 550,000 consumers were defaulters, the CEO added.

Excess billing

The committee directed the water and power ministry to take steps for elimination of overbilling as it affected the ordinary domestic consumers the hardest.

Umar Rasool, Additional Secretary at the ministry, expressed confidence that the problem of overbilling would be solved next year.

“We are set to implement mobile meter reading system across the country, but meter readers are the main hurdle in implementing this digital reading process,” he said.

“Many meter readers have been laid off by Discos for inciting workers to resist this digital reading process.”

He told the committee that 88 per cent of the consumers in Lahore had been given digital meters. The percentage for Islamabad, Faisalabad and Multan stood at 90.

The committee directed the management of the Indus River System Authority to give approved share of water to every province in order to pre-empt charges of discrimination.

In their briefing, officials of IRSA said that from 1992 to 2016, the total amount of water received by Sindh fell six per cent short of its quota while Punjab’s share fell nine per cent short. Balochistan got only 60 per cent of its quota. On the other hand, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s share exceeded its quota.

This year Sindh has been given 15pc in excess of its quota while other provinces too will get a higher share than their quota, the officials told the committee.

Published in Dawn September 22nd, 2016