Hyderabad: Telangana Southern Power Distribution Corporation Ltd, which supplies power to the southern zone, including Hyderabad, could privatise functions like meter reading and revenue collection in the city’s south circle, in the wake of above-average distribution loss and poor bill collection, said an electricity employees’ union leader.
Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, K. Eshwar Rao, president of the Telangana State United Electricity Employees Union, attributed the high losses in the south circle, which covers the Old City, to the management's lack of vision. "While normal transmission losses in the city are around 10 per cent, the south circle suffers from a staggering 40 to 42 per cent loss, primarily due to theft. Instead of addressing this issue, TGSPDCL is pushing for privatisation," he said.
According to Eshwar Rao, efforts were underway to transfer revenue collection and meter reading functions in the south circle to a private company. This company would retain 25 per cent of collections and return 75 per cent to the discom.
The union recently held a lunch-hour demonstration at the TGSPDCL office to protest the privatisation move. Eshwar Rao warned said the union would escalate the agitation if the government did not drop the privatisation move, especially given the state’s energy sector losses amounting to Rs 85,000 crore, of which Rs 48,000 crore is owed by government departments.
Highlighting another issue, he said that many electricity workers in the south circle have been attacked by consumers, the latest incident surfacing last week in Sanatnagar, during meter readings or revenue collection. It was only after the union exerted pressure that the TGSPDCL filed cases in Begum Bazaar and Asmangarh incidents earlier this year.
Eshwar Rao said that political pressure complicated the duties of electricity employees in the south circle and cited the incident of a local MLA staging a protest in front of a police station to demand the release of individuals arrested for assaulting an electricity department employee.
