The Water and Power Development Authority is all set to install new 840,000 digital meters to mint more money from the electricity consumers, as reportedly these meters are quite ‘express’ (fast) and will put extra burden on the inflation-hit people. The residents of Rawalpindi have bemoaned the apathy of the government in replacing old meters with these fast meters, which will put extra burden on them.
The Wapda officials, however, claimed that they were installing new meters to stop ‘theft of electricity’.
Wapda Line Superintendent Sub-Division Committee Chowk Syed Muhammad Iqbal told ‘The News’, “We are installing most modern digital electricity meters in place of old analogue meters in all sub-divisions to stop electricity theft.”
He said that in total there are 28 sub-divisions in Rawalpindi and almost 30,000 domestic and commercial consumers are using electricity in every sub-division. “We would change electricity meters in phases. We have changed around 50,000 domestic and commercial electricity meters in different sub-divisions in a week, he added.
When asked, he said the authority would not charge the amount of replacing new digital electricity meters from the consumers and even not put the amount of these meters in electricity bills.
However, a Wapda official on condition of anonymity told ‘The News’ that there were two reasons behind installing digital meters, as first of all government wants to generate more revenue through electricity bills therefore digital meters will be installed with all commercial and domestic connections. Secondly, he alleged that some bigwigs of the authority received ‘commission’ for procurement of numberless electricity meters from a company. The authorities will sell the old analogue meters to another company and get their commission as well, so by doing so they will earn money from both ends, he added.
He claimed that no one could stop ‘electricity theft’ from the country, and it is impossible to check this practice, as mainly Wapda officials are involved in this practice.
Talking to ‘The News’ people belong to different walks of life strongly rejected Wapda’s plan of installing new digital electricity meters.
They said that people were already being burdened by huge electricity bills and the new meters will put more burden on them.
Nadia Khan, a housewife and resident of Committee Chowk said that Wapda officials changed electricity meters in their locality despite resistance showed by the inhabitants of the area. She said that at the time of changing old meters with analogue meters, the concerned authority also claimed of taking the step to check ‘electricity theft’ and now they are once again doing the same, but their only intent seems to be robbing the people.