MSEDCL yet to recover Rs 686 crore arrears from consumers in Mumbai Metropolitan Region

MUMBAI: Apart from suffering huge losses during Cyclone Tauktae recently, the MSEDCL is yet to recover Rs 686 crore electricity bill arrears from consumers across Mumbai Metropolitan Region.
On Friday, MSEDCL chief engineer Suresh Ganeshkar appealed to consumers in MMR to assist the state power company by clearing all pending payments.
He further said : "The money is required to purchase power from generating units while also for daily operational and maintenance expenses. Of the total arrears, Rs 200 crore is pending for payment of electricity bills from residential consumers in MMR for the past one year while commercial users have arrears to the tune of Rs 120 crore."
The latest statistics show that industry consumers also have pending power bills in MMR to the tune of Rs 88 crore. At the same time, Rs 195 crore has to be paid for the street lights to the power utility firm. "The maximum money for streetlights has to come from Pen circle gram panchayat," said an official, adding that the MSEDCL has suggested to them to opt for "automatic switch systems" so that streetlights are shut during daytime and do not consume power unnecessarily.
The MMR covers Mulund-Bhandup, Thane, Navi Mumbai, Panvel and Pen areas. In February, MSEDCL had launched a drive to temporarily disconnect power supply of consumers who failed to pay the bills. When the drive was launched, around 47,000 consumers in the Mumbai region paid up after receiving notices and MSEDCL was able to recover Rs 62 crore. Subsequently, more than one lakh connections were temporarily disconnected and the consumers paid up. But the arrears continued to pile up along with interest rate, an official added.