New meters in rural areas for 16-hour supply

NOIDA: The power department will set up camps from Wednesday in rural areas of Jewar, Dankaur and Dadri to regularize meters. The camps will implement a fixed tariff of Rs 180 per kV, replacing the earlier Rs 180 per connection.
The proposed drive is part of a plan to meet the target of providing 16 hours of power to rural areas by 2016. For this, it is necessary to have regular monitoring and auditing in rural areas, where unmetered connections lead to widespread revenue loss to the power department.
"Consumers will now have to pay according to the consumed load, instead of paying for an irregular connection," Arvind Rajvedi, superintending engineer, Paschimanchal Vidyut Vitaran Nigam Limited, Noida, said.
While new connections will be metered under the fixed tariff, old meter connections will be regularized on new tariff lines, Rajvedi said. Any feeder that gets regularized in these areas will henceforth, supply more power. "It is in the interest of rural consumers to take a metered connection and pay according to consumption," said Rajvedi.