Haryana: Soon, individual electricity connections to every flat in housing societies

GURUGRAM: Instead of a single-point connection, discoms in the state are considering giving individual connections to each residence in housing clusters such as highrise societies, officials said on Sunday.

The move, they said, will ensure that every flat owner gets a separate electricity connection. This could potentially lower the tariffs paid by households by bringing them under a uniform payment system of government charges and
improve transparency.In 2013, a single point-connection was made mandatory by the Haryana Electricity Regulatory Commission (HERC) for every housing society. Under this, the discom provided one connection for the entire society, which is then branched out into

separate connections by the builder or the RWA. The discom bills the society on a collective reading of the single-point connection. The society internally divides the bill according to the power usage of each house.

This internal division of bill also means the developers or the RWAs decide the rates they charge from residents for every unit of electricity consumed. For instance, residents of societies in Gurugram pay anywhere between Rs 7 to Rs 14
per unit of electricity they use. Once the houses get direct connections of their own, they have to directly pay tariffs to the discom based on separate meters for their house. It also means that they will pay the standardised amounts of Rs 2 to 7 per unit depending on the slab of electricity they fall under. (Users consuming 0-50 units have to pay Rs 2/unit and those between 501-800 units have to pay Rs 7.1/unit). Discoms told TOI that several residents have received complaints about inflated bills by the developers and RWAs.

“We can convert these single point connections on the request of RWAs intomultiple connections directly under DHBVN to ensure better power supply. The required infrastructure should be adequate from the builder’s side,” said PC
Meena, managing director of Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN). Its implementation will be made mandatory after an official statement is made.

Many residents in Gurugram said the change will benefit them. “People will be happy to become direct customers of DHBVN,” said Yashish Yadav, president of the Dwarka Expressway Welfare Association.

Gaurav Prakash, who lives in a society in Sector 109, echoed a similar view. “After becoming direct customers, we will be able to take the benefit of slab variation in electricity charges. It will be more economical,” he said, adding that this will bring transparency in the functioning of RWAs as well. Some associations, however, said there will be no power with the RWAs to take action against residents who don’t pay their bills and maintenance on time. “Under the single point-connection, RWAs could disconnect power supply supply in case of nonpayment of maintenance charges. Once residents become direct customers, the RWAs will face difficulty in collection of maintenance charges,” said Praveen Malik, spokesperson for the United Association of New Gurugram.