Haryana to regularise illegal ‘Kundi’ power connections

CHANDIGARH - If you can’t beat them, join them. Adopting this policy, a power distribution agency in Haryana has decided to regularize illegal “Kundi” power connections within its jurisdiction to contain pilferage of electricity.

A senior official of the Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (UHBVN) said Thursday that its directors had decided that the cases of pilferage of electricity may be minimised by regularisation of ‘Kundi’ connections.

He said that it has been decided that the UHBVN would arrange camps, including those in villages, to release on-the-spot connections to domestic category consumers for which the meters would be procured.

The UHBVN, in recent months, has intensified its campaign to curb theft of power, a spokesman of the corporation said.

The operation, metering and protection and vigilance staff of the UHBVN checked 68,604 consumer premises in recent weeks and detected 12,895 cases of pilferage of power, he added.

A penalty of Rs.24.96 crore (Rs.294.6 million) has been imposed on the erring consumers and the Nigam recovered Rs.12.63 crore (Rs.126.3 mn) from them. In 3,898 cases, the complaints have been lodged with police. Police have registered 59 First Information Reports against the consumers involved in theft of power.

He added that in most of the cases, the erring consumers were found stealing power through illegal direct connections (”Kundis”), bypassing or tampering with the meters or by managing fake meter seals.