FRIDAY, APRIL 26, 2024
Team Herald
PANJIM: Upset over the ordeal they had to face, a family from Nerul has demanded that the Power Department apologises to them after wrongfully disconnecting their power line even though they had already paid their bill on time and had cleared their earlier dues regularly as well.
On Tuesday, February 23, Manuel D’Mello was running from pillar to post, after he got a shock, when a linesman and another official from the Electricity Department arrived at his house and disconnected his power line. Even though Manuel had paid his bill earlier this month and the last day for that payment was February 24.
“They did this without having served me any notice. We told this to the linesman that we had not received anything in writing and demanded that they restore our connection as we were not in the wrong,” said Manuel.
The power bill to the electrical connection that is registered in his wife’s name Perpetua D'Mello of House Number. 815 in Dandadi Nerul, also has no pending balance that needed to be cleared.
“I want to highlight this because these kinds of errors on the government’s part cause a great deal of stress to the common man and I hope others do not have to suffer the way we did. Imagine if we were not at home. We threatened to take the linesman to the court if they did not rectify what happened,” Manuel recalled, while speaking to Herald.
While the linesmen restored the power connection on the same day itself, Manuel was aghast later when the Power Department informed him via their helpline number 1912, that now he has to pay the fee for reconnecting the line.
“Why should I do this when they made the mistake of disconnecting our line? They spoke to us roughly saying we haven’t paid Rs 2,000 but we showed them all the proof that we paid the present bill of Rs 845 and previous bills too on time,” Manuel added.
