Power consumer grievances at KERC hearing throw light on GESCOM’s corrupt practices

Chairman of Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission P. Ravi Kumar speaking at a public hearing on tariff revision at the district administrative complex in Kalaburagi on Monday.
| Photo Credit: ARUN KULKARNI

At a public hearing that Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC) organised in Kalaburagi on Monday to seek objections and suggestions from power consumers on power tariff revision sought by Gulbarga Electricity Supply Company Limited (GESCOM), many power consumers, especially farmers and small-scale industrialists, raised grievances not related to power tariff but directly connected to power supply company’s poor performance, incompetency, lethargy and corruption.

“I paid the prescribed fees for regularisation of power supply to my irrigation pumpset in 2002. GESCOM has not taken any action even after 22 years. Local GESCOM engineers demanded ₹15,000 bribe which I refused to pay. My connection has not been regularised even after I paid fees and penalties,” a farmer from Lingsugur in Raichur district Basavaraj G., who came all the way to Kalaburagi to present his grievances to KERC, said at the public hearing.

“A project to supply drinking water to every household in rural areas of Raichur district is being implemented. The contractor illegally got electricity connection to implement the project. It is essentially a power theft case. When I asked for details under the RTI [Right to Information] Act, GESCOM staff acknowledged the power theft and imposed a fine of ₹4.80 lakh on the contractor. Does GESCOM expect a person from civil society to take action against power theft? If it proactively takes stringent action against power theft, it can save so much energy and get a considerable amount of revenues that there will be no need for seeking hike in power tariff,” a farmer from Raichur Mallikarjun told KERC.

“I had power connection for my Ganga Kalyan scheme. Unfortunately, power lines were stolen. Now, I don’t have power connection for my irrigation pumpset. When I approached the local police station with a complaint, the police sent me back stating that the owner of the stolen property, which is GESCOM, should file a complaint. GESCOM did not file a complaint. At the end of the day, I do not have power connection for my irrigation pumpset,” according to farmer from Kalaburagi.

Paramesh from Kalaburagi district complained that GESCOM officials demanded ₹50,000 bribe to replace a defunct transformer. He added that denial of bribe has resulted in loss to farmers as GESCOM officials did not replace the transformer that was crucial to power their irrigation pumpsets.

“A live electricity wire is threatening the lives of people. It passes so close to residential and school buildings that anybody can accidentally come in contact with it. I don’t know how many lives it has claimed. We have repeatedly requested GESCOM officials to shift the live wire to save lives. They, however, have not responded to our pleas. They may act only after the live wire kills some people,” a resident of Chincholi told KERC.

A consumer said that he complained to GESCOM about power theft in some of the places in his town and GESCOM officials came to his house the next day to check whether I was stealing power. “It was an attempt to prevent me from raising my voice against irregularities and corruption,” he added.

These are the few grievances that power consumers raised during the public hearing organised to seek public objection to GESCOM’s plea for power tariff revision to fill gaps between revenues and expenditure for the next three years. However, these issues unrelated to the public hearing irked KERC brass.

“What is this? What is going on in GESCOM? Why didn’t you regularise the connection to the irrigation pumpset even after receiving fees for it 22 years ago? It shows that you [GESCOM] are not conducting power consumers meetings at the local level to redress their grievances,” a shocked KERC Chairman P. Ravi Kumar said.

Intervening at this point, social activist and energy expert Deepak Gala said that GESCOM has failed to conduct its quarterly consumer interaction meetings to address consumers grievances.

“GESCOM has 61 sub-divisions where it should mandatorily hold consumer interaction meetings chaired by a either Superintending Engineer or an Executive Engineer to redress grievances. However, GESCOM failed to conduct such meetings in 27 sub-divisions in 2023-24. It has conducted the meetings in only four sub-divisions in 2024-25,” he said.

In his response, GESCOM Managing Director Ravindra Karalingannavar assured the KERC and the people who attended the public hearing that he will investigate each case and resolve them as soon as possible.