Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao on Saturday announced waiver of the pending power bills of Scheduled Tribes.
A meeting, chaired by Mr. Rao, with public representatives belonging to STs on Saturday discussed huge pendency of power dues by STs in the domestic category.
Of the dues amounting to ₹70 crore, Mr. Rao said the government will reimburse power distribution companies to the extent of ₹40 crore.
The balance ₹30 crore will be waived by transmission corporation on its own, the corporation chairman and managing direcgtor D. Prabhakar Rao said.
Mr. Rao told the meeting that all cases related to power booked against STs will also be scrapped. Power connections will be given to all habitations, households, agricultural pump sets and patta lands having record of rights belonging to STs. The pump sets and patta lands with RoR rights will get free power. Funds will be allocated in the next budget to construct roads for all ST habitations. Only local children will be admitted to residential schools to be set up in tribal areas. Self employment schemes like supply of subsidised sheep will be extended to STs.
The connections to individual houses should be given with an application fee of only ₹125.
The service wire, internal wiring and two electric bulbs will be provided in each house. There will be no energy charges for consumption up to 50 units a month, the officials informed Mr. Rao.
He regretted that there was no three phase connection to 8,734 villages out of 9,737 tribal habitations in Telangana. Therefore, all of them should get three phase connections.
