More check

Patna, Nov. 30: Patna Electric Supply Undertaking (Pesu) has intensified its drive to check electricity theft in its all its 10 divisions in the state capital. The officials have already lodged several FIRs against 150 consumers for either resorting to theft or not paying the dues.

In the drive, which Pesu launched in November, efforts are on to nail the consumers, who have either resorted to power theft, or have large payment dues. There have been several reported cases of hooking as well as those of getting the connections restored after they had been snapped.

Pesu, has already started issuing notices to such consumers who owe a bill of more than Rs 20,000.

“The body has been successful in getting the thefts detected due to its rigorous and continuous adherence to the scheme of energy accounting,” Pesu (east) superintending engineer J.P.N. Singh told The Telegraph.

Singh said that energy accounting was possible due to the fact that almost 90 per cent of the transformers have been fitted with distribution transformer (DT) metre, which showed the actual consumption of electricity from which the consumers received their connections.

Explaining how it would detect cases of power theft, Singh said: “Suppose DT metre shows the reading as 100 units and the accumulated reading of all the consumers connected from that particular transformer show 50 units, it clearly suggests that 50 units are being utilised illegally.”

“With the help of DT-based energy accounting, we get to know the actual locations from where people are resorting to electricity theft and have got the lines connected illegally. The energy accounting also helps in the detection of the over-loaded transformers. We are conducting raids in that particular area,” he said. He added that they have been able to locate so far we have lodged more than FIRs against 100 such persons in this connection,” he said.

Pesu (West) has also lodged several FIRs besides conducting raids.

“In the western part, we have lodged about 60 FIRs besides conducting raids and disconnect who either resorted to theft or owe a bill of more than Rs 20,000. The drive will be intensified further in the coming days,” Rajiv Amit, Pesu (West) superintending engineer told The Telegraph.

Amit said that energy accounting has been in the process over the last year but it has been used to detect the theft only in the recent months.

“We are conducting raids on a daily basis and the connections of 30 to 40 people are being disconnected almost every day,” he added.