Patna, Feb. 1: Higher education in the capital seems to be in the throes of darkness, literally.

Power connection to various colleges, including Patna College, was snapped three days back for alleged non-payment of electricity bills. In the absence of electricity, academic and administrative work is suffering big time.

Patna College principal Lalkeshwar Prasad Singh said: “There is no power for the past three days. The worst part is that Patna Electric Supply Undertaking (Pesu) has snapped connection without informing the college administration.”

Sources said Pesu had issued a bill of around Rs 80 lakh to Patna College in March 2011. The college administration asked Pesu to issue a fresh bill as they suspected overbilling. Singh said: “We were shocked to receive the electricity bill amounting to Rs 80 lakh. We thought we had been handed over an inflated bill. The college administration requested Pesu to issue a fresh bill. A year has passed but neither a corrected bill was provided nor any Pesu official came to our office for reading the meter.”

Singh said: “The power connection was snapped on Monday without informing us. We are running educational institutions, not industries. We are planning to approach the high court in this regard.”

Pesu general manager SKP Singh said: “The power connection to Patna College has been snapped because of non-payment of electricity dues. The college has run up a bill of Rs 1.19 crore in the past five years.”

Singh added: “Despite repeated notices to the college administration to settle all dues, there was no payment by the institute. We had no other option but to snap the power connection.” Sources said the college had not paid dues for the past five years.

Power connection to Patna Science College, too, has been snapped. The college has dues of Rs 66.08 lakh, while AN College owes Rs 1.68 crore.

Students are the worst sufferers. Gopal Sinha, an undergraduate physics student of AN College, said: “We are dependent on generators for the past few weeks. It causes a lot of problems for our practical classes, as we can operate only a few computers.”

The sources said power would be restored at AN College within a few days as its administration has agreed to a settlement.