Legislators want prepaid meters for defaulters first
Questioning the electricity department's motive behind forcing prepaid smart meters on consumers, legislators on Monday recommended that smart meters be rolled out to those who defaulted in their payments.
Legislators said the deployment of prepaid meters at the premises of defaulters would help the department recover Rs 800-odd dues.
'Why do you need prepaid smart meters for people who clear the bills on time? It should be made mandatory for the defaulters who owe the department,' said BJP Legislator Nilesh Cabral.
Margao MLA Digambar Kamat agreed with Cabral, while GFP MLA Vijai Sardesai condemned the entire project.
'This is a reckless hike and the smart meters will also put the common man in trouble,' said Sardesai.
Power minister Ramkrishna Dhavalikar said that the prepaid smart meter project was introduced as part of the Centre's initiative. The department says that 7.5 lakh meters will be replaced, with about Rs 9.6 crore per month being paid to the vendor.
Legislators also demanded that the electricity tariff hike be withdrawn.
by Taboola
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For 2025-26, the department proposed an overall tariff hike of 5.75%, out of which 70% of the domestic consumers will see around a 3% increase in monthly bills. The slabs for higher consumption will see relatively higher hikes. 'With this hike, you will get Rs 200 crore every year. But the bills where govt owes dues will still be pending. If these dues are recovered, then there will be no need for a hike,' said opposition leader Yuri Alemao.
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Smart meters from Dec, govt offices 1st in line
Porvorim:
The installation of smart meters will commence by Dec in a phased manner. The electricity department signed an agreement with DigiSmart Network Pvt Ltd, Jaipur, on May 29, for the installation of the meters and already provided all technical details to it, power minister Ramkrishna 'Sudin' Dhavalikar told the assembly on Monday.
The project implementation plan was finalised, and DigiSmart Network, which is in the process of finalising vendors for the supply of hardware and IT systems related to implementation.
More than 12,000 meters of govt premises and govt offices will be replaced with smart meters first. This will be followed by 827 meters of the power department's substation feeders and then 6,224 industrial consumers. In the last phase, around 7.2 lakh commercial and domestic consumers' meters will be replaced with smart meters.
The department recently asked people to make all their meters accessible to meter readers. Govt has identified 39,894 meters that are not accessible to meter readers. Of these, 830 were relocated. TNN
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