Patna, Dec. 24: The combing operation launched by Bihar State Electricity Board (BSEB) has made the power body richer by Rs 65 lakh in just one week.

Leading the pack in revenue realisation on account of theft is Patna from where BSEB has collected Rs 50.47 lakh so far.

The power board started the combing operation in four cities — Patna, Gaya, Muzaffarpur and Purnea — on December 17. Under the operation, a team of power board officials has been carrying out door-to-door verification of electricity connections.

The team verifies the meters, power load on the premises, and power theft by consumers through any means. The board, which had earlier appealed to the consumers to get their power load and well as meters verified, is taking strict action against the defaulters. No only are they being fined on the spot but also FIRs are being lodged against them.

The board has managed to collect a revenue of Rs 50.47 lakh from the consumers of the state capital either on account of theft or for using more than permissible limit of load or meter tampering, Patna Electric Supply Undertaking (Pesu) general manager SKP Singh said.

“Basically, the idea is to provide services at the doorstep of consumers so that they do not face any difficulty regarding any electricity matter. Under this operation, we have constituted 10 teams for all 10 divisions under Pesu. The services for which consumers have to make rounds of power board offices are being made available at their doorstep. The inspection team also resolves electricity-related problems of consumers on the spot,” Singh said.

The inspection teams, which go to consumers’ house/premises, verify timely delivery of bills, irregularity in meter reading, meter tampering, load misuse, indulgence in theft, metre replacement and others.

“We have been conducting on an average 150 inspections/checks per day for the past one week. The team has conducted inspection in houses in Gulzarbagh and Kankerbagh divisions, wherein most of the cases pertained to load enhancement,” the general manager said.

The power board team have inspected 1,043 consumer premises so far and detected at least 38 cases of theft. It has imposed a fine of Rs 74.5 lakh on defaulting consumers in the state capital during the operation.

Power board (finance and revenue) member Vinayak Chandra Gupta, director, security, Sumit Kumar, who is heading the operations, on Friday made inspections in Hanuman Nagar area and detected electricity theft worth Rs 22.39 lakh from eight premises. The defaulters together paid a fine of Rs 26.95 lakh, including the interest. Gupta gave instructions to the inspection team to resolve the cases on the spot.