The parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has directed the government to recover billions due of dedicated feeders and trunk lines -- from the industries -- after Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) failed to take action against them.
A meeting of the mini parliament today, validating the study report of its sub-committee, also asked the government to recover the dues within a month.
In July 2019, the PAC had formed a five-member sub-committee led by Nepali Congress (NC) leader Minendra Rijal to study the issues of controversy on whether it is legitimate to charge the industries with the premium charges or not. The sub-committee has sorted out Rs 14.08 billion dues of the industries for the use of dedicated feeders and trunk lines.
The NEA supplied electricity to around 300 industries under the special facility -- as dedicated and trunk lines -- even when the country was reeling under up to 18 hours of load-shedding. The NEA had imposed 65 per cent as premium charge for the users of such dedicated and trunk lines. However, the industries refused the premium charge, after the NEA asked them to pay. The NEA has since then repeatedly sent notices to the industrialists asking to settle their electricity dues. Instead of paying their charges, the industrialists went to the Prime Minister asking for waiver of the charges. Due to the private sector's lobbying, a cabinet meeting, last year, even waived the premium charge for eight-and-a-half months of the total dues to minimize excess financial burden on the industrialists. After the cabinet decision, the industrialists now are supposed to settle the dues of only 28 months and 11 days.
But the industrialists have been reluctant to clear their dues, arguing that it is not appropriate for the NEA to levy additional fees even after the power utility announced the end of load-shedding in 2016.
No comments:
Post a Comment