HYDERABAD, Dec 20: Role of the Hyderabad Electricity Supply Company (Hesco) came under fire in the district council session here on Wednesday for issuing inflated bills to the consumers and declaring them as ‘power thieves’. The council members demanded reduced power tariff for the consumers.

The members debated the issue after a joint resolution tabled by Ashraf Naqshbandi, Parveen Akhtar Lodhi and Mohammad Ehsan was taken-up by the convener Zafar Ali Rajput for discussion in the presence of Hesco's chief engineer (operations), Ghulam Hussain Kolachi.

Almost all the members gave vent to their feelings against Hesco's unabated issuance of exaggerated and detection bills to consumers for no fault of theirs and maintained that the SDOs were not ready to correct bills while superintending engineer remained inaccessible.

The convenor praised Hesco officials for attending council's meeting although they were not under administrative control of district government and criticised those Executive District Officers (EDOs) who were not paying heed to council's repeated calls for attending sessions. He said that open kutcheries should be organised in areas and decision taken at a meeting with the district nazim should be implemented.

Mohammad Ehsan sarcastically said that it had become a routine for Hesco to issue detection bills to consumers because its performance was below par adding that no attention was paid to fragile distribution network of the power utility and naked wires could be found in residential areas. He said that in case of any casualty he would get the case registered against the concerned Hesco official and alleged that power theft had increased under the very nose of Hesco employees.

Q.Mohammad Hakim pointed out that detection bills were not legal in any sense and it indicated that either officers were corrupt and not competent enough to work in department. He said that if able officers were posted then the system might improve adding that while power pilferage through "kundas" could be noticed by the consumers the same remained invisible to officers.

Rauf Jafri blamed the Hesco employers for not attending their offices and involvement in malpractices. He demanded reduction in electricity rates . “They want to dub 90 per cent of power consumers as power thieves", he said while lambasting Hesco for handing over consumers with exaggerated bills and then making them to shuffle between different offices for getting the bills rectified.

Munawar Zaid, a former Wapda employee, said that even retired employees who were entitled free units were served with detection bills and that only a few honest officials could be found in this utility. “I was given a detection bill of Rs 80,000 in year 2000”, he said. He said that factories and cane juice selling machines were getting power supply through illegal gratification without any action by senior officials.

Mehboob Abro quoted some statistics of detection bills to show that it had become a common practice among SDOs. He said that only in Qasimabad and Gari Khata sub-divisions 2.1 million and 6.6 million units were charged by way of detection in November. “It has ruined the life of people. Even fee for television license is being charged from those cabins and shops which did not have TV sets", he claimed. He said that authority for correcting detection bills should be delegated to the executive engineers also.

Rashid Khan said that Hesco was contributing greatly in encroachments because its employees erected electricity poles in the middle of roads to facilitate encroaches to raise unauthorised construction and added that such poles should be removed from roads and meters of those shops withdrawn.