A PIL has been filed in the Allahabad High Court regarding the cases of high meter reading, arbitrary billing as well as irregularities in bills being done through meter readers and reducing units.
Social worker Yogendra Kumar Pandey has filed the petition through Advocates Vijay Chandra Srivastava and Sunita Sharma before the High Court on the basis of complaints like getting an electricity bill of Rs 3000 to Rs 5000 even after lighting two bulbs.
In this petition, the prayer seeks the High Court to stop robbing of more than 80,000 consumers of the city on the basis of smart meters and to replace smart meters and install old manual meters.
The petition said that due to the high readings in smart meters installed in seven divisions of the city, a large number of consumers are complaining to JE, SDO due to the electricity bills being four to five times higher. The officers are not listening to the people who come to rectify the irregularities in the electricity distribution sections. Due to this, the problems of the people are increasing. People are wildly worried about the electricity bills, the PIL said.
It also mentions the complaints of many such consumers, whose old meter bills were coming for Rs 500 to Rs 700 and after the installation of smart meters, they are three to four times higher readings.
The petitioner’s Advocates Vijay Chandra Srivastava and Sunita Sharma said thousands of consumers of Prayagraj Smart City have been affected by the faulty smart meters and are facing problems in paying bills to getting the rectification done.
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Department officials are sending wrong bills and then rigging is being done in the name of rectifying them. The petition further said the protest against arbitrary meter reading is being heard and seen every day. But the engineers responsible in the electricity department do not even have time to get these complaints investigated.
Advocate Vijay Chandra said the problems related to the discrepancy in the meter and bill and reducing the unit charge on the unit and many other electricity related problems have become very serious and the officials are sleeping peacefully.
They have appealed to the electricity consumers of the city to explain the problems related to smart meters. For this, Advocates have issued mobile numbers. It has also been asked to send complaints related to electricity meters due to disturbance of electricity bills on these numbers, so that they can be presented before the court.