CANACONA
In a last ditch bid, Dy Speaker and Canacona MLA Isidore Fernandes made a fervent appeal to the power consumers of Canacona to take the benefits of OTS scheme in clearing outstanding and long pending electricity bills before end of this month.
Responding to government introducing One Time Settlement Scheme for closed and active power bills, Electricity Department in Canacona alone had made around Rs27 lakhs recoveries from Revenue Recovery Cases (RRC) and Active Consumers so far.
As the OTS scheme will be in force till December 31, Dy Speaker and Canacona MLA Isidore Fernandes appealed to power consumers of Canacona to take the benefits of the scheme in clearing pending bills by paying only principal amount. 'In case a consumer or defaulter clears pending amounts in one or Two installments, 100% of late fee(interest) will be waived off, though there are benefits of paying as many as six installments with corresponding waivers of delay payments/interest fees." Fernandes said.
"It's a win-win situation to the active domestic as well as commercial installations, as interests billed up to Oct 13 on the outstanding amounts of active as well as closed electricity connections/bills. People should not leave this to pass off without taking its benefits," Fernandes added.
When contacted, Canacona Electricity Assistant Engineer Sanjay Gaonkar informed, "The response is good in Canacona, but many active consumers who have pending bills for 3-5 months can still come forward and take the benefits of this OTS. Canacona has around Rs50 lakhs in defaults of electricity bills payments, which the department has also initiated Revenue Recovery Cases(RCC). In many cases the amounts have increased manifolds due to levy of interest on interests on principle amounts. While payments in two installments give benefits of complete waiver of interests, the subsequent addition of each month gives 20% waivers of late fee amounts."
Incidentally, Electricity Department is likely to commence disconnection of active connections, whose pending bills are beyond 2 months due.
