‘Unmetered connections, pilferage reasons for lesser realisation from Valley’
Bivek Mathur
JAMMU, Apr 13: Continuing with what has become a convention now, the Jammu region has yet again consumed less power and paid more tariff in the year 2022-23 as well as compared to the Kashmir region where consumption is comparatively high.
As per the official data available with the Excelsior, for the period March 2022-February 2023, the total consumption of power in the Jammu Division was 8416.17 Million Units (MUs) or 846 crore units as against 11665.2 MUs or 1167 crore units of the power consumed by Kashmir but the Jammu region has paid a tariff of Rs 2050 crores as against Rs 1530 crores’ tariff generated from the Kashmir region.
In the year 2021-22 as well, the Kashmir region consumed more power as compared to the Jammu region.
As per the official figures, while the Jammu region consumed 7824.984 MUs of the power in the period April 2021-March 2022 and paid a tariff of Rs 1736 crores the Kashmir region consumed 11646.237 MUs and Ladakh region 399.532 MUs. The power tariff realization comparatively was also high from the Jammu region in 2021-22 as compared to the Kashmir region.
As far as increase/decrease in the power consumption in Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh regions in the year 2022-23 is concerned, it increased in Jammu region by 0.15% and decreased in Kashmir (-9.34%) and Ladakh (-4.63%) regions respectively.
Justifying the reasons for high power tariff realization from the Jammu region, a statement issued by the Jammu Power Distribution Corporation Limited (JPDCL), has stated that it (JPDCL) has taken various measures including cutting down electricity losses considerably, providing quality and continuous power supply to the consumers, bringing down the damage rate of the worn-out transformers, and installation of smart meters in the Jammu region.
The statement said that the electricity losses for the Jammu region have also been brought down below 50% for the first time.
“The aggregate transmission and distribution losses have been brought down to 47% for the financial year 2022-23 as compared to 53% for the previous year,” read the statement.
The JPDCL has also attributed the increase in the power consumption to the improved services being provided to the consumers.
“The power outages have also reduced in the last year by more than 13% and JPDCL has added huge infrastructure including new Distribution Transformers, and cables to provide quality power to the consumers,” read the JPDCL statement.
“The damage rate of the existing Distribution Transformers has been brought down by more than 20%,” it further said.
The statement further said that a total of 92000 smart meters have been installed thus far in various areas of Jammu City and JPDCL has set a target of installing more than 2.5 lakh smart meters in the next 5 months in the city.
As per the statement, the JPDCL has completely stopped the scheduled power curtailment in the areas where smart meters have been installed in Jammu.
It further said that under the Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme, more than 8 lakh smart meters/prepaid are proposed to be installed across the Jammu region.
The JPDCL has also informed that the power supply of all the consumers under domestic, commercial, and industrial category who have not paid any instalment of electricity bill continuously for 3 months shall be disconnected automatically with the smart meters.
“JPDCL is overburdened with huge arrears on account of domestic electricity dues. However, under the Amnesty Scheme, JPDCL has collected more than 80 crores’ revenue with more than fifty thousand consumers benefiting from the scheme,” the official JPDCL statement said, while requesting the defaulting consumers to avail the benefit of the scheme immediately.
Meanwhile, Principal Secretary, Power Development Department (PDD), Jammu and Kashmir, H Rajesh Prasad, cited various reasons for lesser realization of power tariff from Kashmir valley including high number of unmetered connections, high accumulation of power arrears of the consumers, power pilferages, and practice of non-payment of power bills by the people in the region.
According to him, out of 11 lakh power connections, 8 lakh are unmetered in the Valley.
“But we’ve geared up the drive to install meters in the unmetered areas on a war-footing to increase the tariff realization,” he said.
He further said, “the other reason for lesser generation of the tariff from Kashmir region is high accumulation of the arrears due to non-payment of bills for months and years together by the Kashmiri households and industries. But we’ve launched various incentives and initiatives to make people pay in easy instalments.”
Power pilferage, according to him, is the other reason for lesser realization of the revenue from Kashmir.
“These unfair practices are also common in the Jammu region but the severity is low as compared to the Kashmir region,” he said.
To curb various unfair practices causing a loss to the State exchequer, he said, “we’ve started raising proper bills, curbing pilferage by installing smart meters, beefing up enforcement drives, and disconnecting unregistered connections, to ensure proper realization of the revenue.”
“And these measures will continue to ensure that the people in Kashmir region also pay their electricity bills as per their consumption,” he said.
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