Delhi and Maharashtra Residents Cry Foul Over Inflated Electricity Bills

The residents of Delhi and Mumbai are in a state of shock after receiving exorbitant electricity bills in June. The residents complained that the bills have been sent without any actual readings of the meters.

Delhi's Greater Kailash resident Sandeep Anand told India Today that his electricity bill for last June was Rs 7,000, but this time he has been sent a bill of Rs 12,000. Resident of Lajpat Nagar, Hemant said that his meter currently shows a reading of 1,835 units but the bill dictates it as 2,100 units.

East Delhi's Residents Welfare Association (RWA) Spokesperson, BS Vohra, told the media that the bill has been inflated for both domestic and commercial consumers, and it is shocking as the establishments were non functional and their consumption was bare minimum.

"While the highest ever peak load of Delhi is only 7409 MW, it's sad that Delhi DISCOMs are collecting the fixed charges on the total sanction of load of 22,876 MW," Vohra was quoted.

The Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission (DERC) must look into the matter and waive all the excessive charges and provide relief to the people, he added.

A similar situation was faced by the residents of Maharashtra, especially Mumbai. Following the large number of complaints from people including celebrity consumers, the Maharashtra Electricity Regulatory Commission (MERC) issued a notice to the representatives of all the four companies that are responsible for issuing the electricity bills in Mumbai, seeking details of the issue.

The companies are MSEDCL, BEST, Adani and Tata Power. According to the National Herald report, the distributors were not allowed to visit the consumers' premises to collect meter readings even since the lockdown order came.

Instead, they issued bills based on the average consumption basis during the lockdown (March-May), except where automatic meter reading facilities were available.

The companies also informed MERC that bills were raised for lockdown periods, based on the average consumption for three months, considering the months of summer when the consumption is normally high.

So, the average amount for the months of March, April and May, have led to higher bills that were issued in June.

However, the state electricity regulators have now taken cognizance of the issue, and have opened a grievance redressal forum for the people to raise complaints. They havevalso asked power firms to not cut supply for non-payment of the bill.

Many people including several Bollywood celebrities took to twitter to flag their concerns over the bills they received this month.

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