The State government of Telangana in South India is seeking to curb the ‘wastage’ of electricity by Government employees by installing pre-paid electricity meters. Any usage over a stipulated maximum will have to be ‘topped up’ by employees. Telangana is one of the 29 states in India and was formed on 2 June 2014 with the city of Hyderabad as its capital.
The New Indian Express reports:
To minimise power usage and also curb wastage, state government has decided to introduce pre-paid electricity meters in government offices. Like mobile phone recharge cards, these meters will be fixed with certain amount of power based on the estimates by officials. This will ensure that the employees do not consume power over the stipulated limit.
The pre-paid energy meter has a mobile SIM-card like feature and as per the procedure, offices will have to recharge their power voucher every month. If any office fails to recharge its voucher, an SMS will be sent to the linked mobile number of Electricity department officer and power gets disconnected automatically.
If the power ‘allotted’ to a particular office or premises gets used up well before the 30-day time limit, the staff will be held responsible and they have to incur additional power bill on their own.
“This will inculcate a sense of fear of paying for the electricity bill from their pockets and the staff will put efforts to save power,” an electricity department official said.
Source: Pre-paid Meters in Telangana Government Offices – The New Indian Express