The Hindu : New Delhi News : Amnesty scheme for power consumers to be re-launched

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Monday, May 05, 2008
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Amnesty scheme for power consumers to be re-launched

Smriti Kak Ramachandran

The revised scheme has been sent to the DERC

The revised scheme allows consumers to replace tampered meters
In case of settlement of theft cases, the scheme will be applicable to all categories of customers

NEW DELHI: The lukewarm response that it received to the amnesty scheme for consumers who are outside the billing net has not deterred the Delhi Government’s Power Department for planning a re-run of the idea.

The Power Department is all set to announce a second phase of the amnesty scheme for consumers. According to sources, the revised scheme has been sent to the Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission and is aimed at getting more consumers to avail themselves of the benefits of the scheme. The revised scheme allows consumers to replace tampered meters of domestic and non-domestic categories and settlement of theft cases pending for all categories of customers.

Pointing out that the revised scheme will offer relief for a larger section of consumers, Delhi Power Minister A.K. Walia said: “Our aim is to stabilise the system and in doing so, provide relief to the people. The scheme has been fine tuned and a lot of work has gone into it.”

The revised scheme will be applicable to voluntary declaration of theft and tampered meters and settlement of theft cases, pending cases already booked but not settled. In the second phase the amnesty and settlement scheme is expected to run for a period of one month from this coming week.

According to the new scheme, for consumers who have tampered electro-mechanical meters, the discoms will replace them with new electronic meters without charging any penalty or cost for the new meter. But in case of a tampered electronic meter, the customer will have to pay the cost of the new meter and an amount equal to aggregate of three most recent bills as per meter reading from the tampered meter.

For consumers living in jhuggi-jhonpri clusters and colonies with fixed monthly charges, the new metered connections can be availed of without payment of any penalty or electricity charges for use of electricity during the past. The date of declaration of the tampered meter by the consumer must be prior to the date of inspection or booking of theft.

In case of settlement of theft cases, the scheme will be applicable to all categories of customers for theft cases already booked but not settled till date. The discoms will settle and close Direct Theft (DT) and Direct Abstraction of Energy (DAE) cases for, all domestic consumers on payment of 40 per cent of the assessed bill while all industrial and commercial consumers will have to pay 50 per cent of the assessed bill raised in DAE / DT cases. All late payment surcharge will be waived off.

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