Bhubaneswar: Highlighting the essentiality of immediate reforms in the financial health of the Central Electricity Supply Utility (CESU) of Odisha, the Chief Executive Officer of the electricity board Arun Bothra on Tuesday issued an ultimatum to consumers to pay their pending arrears by January 15, 2020, failing which power supply would be disconnected immediately.
“At present, the financial condition of CESU is not well. What has made it difficult to function is that lakhs of people have become defaulters in not paying their electricity bills over months and years which has led to piling up of arrears,” Bothra said while addressing a presser today.
“I urge the entire public, be it individual consumers or organisations, to pay their pending dues so that we can provide better services to all,” he said.
Bothra informed that public will be allowed to pay their dues by January 15, 2020 failing which special designated squads will identify the evading consumers and accordingly carry out the power supply disconnection drive from next day.
He however said that if consumers are not able to pay their arrears in a single go, officials at the divisional level can allow people to pay the dues in a maximum of six installments.
Highlighting the details of the outstanding arrears, Bothra said, “Till now total arrears of Rs 1971 crore has been pending under CESU of which around Rs 691 crore is lying against at least 58,548 people who have pending arrears of more than Rs 50,000 on each of their heads.”
“Similarly, there are 1.04 lakh such consumers who are yet to pay a single penny over the last two years. Cumulative arrears of Rs 394 crore is pending against their names. Of the total consumers, around 92 percent are domestic and the total amount of dues pending on them is around Rs 1023 crore. Likewise, around 7.1 consumers are small commercial establishments and the rest industrial consumers,” said Bothra who is also serving as the IG Crime Branch.
Asked about the bills pending against industries, he clarified, “CESU has pending arrears of Rs 108 crore against industries but due to legal disputes in such cases, the board has not been able to collect the dues.”
Bothra noted that the directive will be applicable in all the areas under the jurisdiction of CESU which provides medium voltage power transmission and distribution across nine districts of the State.
On the drive to collect the money from consumers, Bothra said, “We will ensure to create widespread awareness from panchayat to district level so that people can pay their pending dues as soon as possible. SMSes and notices will be sent to defaulters and we will also publish the notification in newspapers.”