Patna, Aug. 30: Bihar State Electricity Board (BSEB) today entered into an agreement with Srei Sahaj e-Village Limited, which runs Vasudha Kendra, for depositing electricity bills at centres so that rural people can deposit bills without making an extra effort. The objective of the move is to strengthen revenue collection at the village-level.

“The agreement, which was signed between the board and Srei Sahaj e-village Limited, would give Sahaj Vasudha Kendra the right to collect electricity bills from the consumers residing in villages,” the board’s director of public relations and its spokesman, H.R. Pandey, said.

He said, with the beginning of the implementation of the initiative common people would get the facility for depositing electricity bills at their nearby vasudha kendra in their own panchayat.

At present, a total of 4,942 vasudha kendras, established by Srei Sahaj e-Village Limited, are being run in the state across 27 districts.

These vasudha kendras provide services, including railway ticket reservation, life insurance, vehicle insurance, crop insurance, e-learning, pension plan for the rural masses, training and employment programmes for youths living below poverty line youths. These kendras also provide marketing research for different companies at the village-level to the rural masses. And with the signing of this agreement, these kendras would also collect electricity bills.

At present, electricity bill collection is done at the block and district levels, which makes the job of bill payment for villagers very difficult. Not only are the centres far away, there are long queues almost all the time.

Sources told The Telegraph that because of the problems even genuine consumers who wish to deposit bills do not turn up, result- ing in a major loss of revenue both for the state government and BSEB.

Pandey pointed out that the new arrangement would come into effect very soon and added that when it is implemented, the people would not face problems in depositing bills.

The BSEB at present serves around 30 lakh consumers across the state. Owing to the shortage of employees, there are not too many collection counters, as a result of which the consumers, particularly those in the rural areas, face a lot of difficulties in depositing the monthly energy bills.

At present, Sahaj is involved in work related to the collection of energy bills in Bengal, Assam and Orissa.

Consumers depositing their monthly bills at Kendra will not require to pay any extra amount for the arrangement.