Residents to sit in protest today; police force to be deployed in large numbers to maintain law & order
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Residents from a Chembur colony are expected to come on to the roads today to agitate after Reliance Energy announced that it would stop power supply to 3,250 customers who have not paid their electricity bills amounting to Rs 63 crore over the past 10 years.
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'Extreme step'
Reliance said in an official statement that it would take the extreme step under section 56 (1) of Electricity Act-2003) as repeated efforts to get residents of Chembur's Siddharth Colony to settle their long-pending dues had failed.
Police authorities said they would be deploying a large number of police personnel in view of the impending action and maintain law and order, because in the past, when power supply to the colony was cut as a warning, the protesting residents had blocked the Eastern Express Highway. "Despite several notices, offers of payment through instalments, and token disconnections, the residents have not paid their bills, resulting in arrears of Rs 63 crore," the company said, adding that the non-payment has resulted in higher tariffs for other customers, who were effectively cross-subsidising customers not paying their dues. It promised to restore power supply immediately upon settlement of outstanding dues.
According to sources, the company would switch off three substations in the vicinity by using a SCADA system (supervisory control and data acquisition), because cutting supply to individual homes would be an impossible task.
According to industry sources, the company is also fighting a case in the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Court against the consumers whose post-dated cheques worth Rs 11 crore were dishonoured.
Also read: Power play: Reliance Energy's team nabs electricty thief from Kandivli
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