Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) has claimed that the government owes to it Rs 46 billion outstanding dues and said that it has to pay only Rs 18 billion to Pepco, and not Rs 44 billion as claimed by it. The National Assembly standing committee has expressed concerns that KESC has not paid Rs 44 billion to Pepco, which the company on Tuesday termed inflated amount, saying that the government should set its record straight, as the original amount is Rs 18 billion only.
According to sources in KESC, different government institutions collectively owe over Rs 46 billion to the financial crisis-hit company. They said that as "consumer tariff subsidy" the government is to pay to the company at least Rs 15.63 billion beside Rs 6.80 billion consumer tariff subsidy/loss of revenue.
They said Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) is yet to pay Rs 8.92 billion to the company. City District Government Karachi and other miscellaneous federal/provincial departments/bodies also owe Rs 2.81 billion and Rs 2.19 billion respectively, to the utility.
The government, sources claimed, also owed Rs 3 billion and Rs 1.40 billion in terms of Financial Implementation Project (FIP) loans and its interest respectively to KESC. The Federal Board of Revenue, they said, is to pay Rs 5.76 billion to the company as general sales tax (GST) refund.
KESC is also demanding of the government Rs 0.06 billion, Rs 0.09 billion and Rs 0.14 billion in terms of adjustment of additional surcharge against GST subsidy for the exempted categories of consumers (July-September 2009), agricultural subsidy for private tube-well consumers of Balochistan (July to November 2009) and all other strategic customers (covered under the IA) respectively, they added.
On the other hand the company has also claimed that during last 14 months, it has made repayments of over Rs 21 billion to National Transmission and Distribution Company (NTDC) alone. The Ministry of Finance has directly been paying to Wapda as tariff differential claim of KESC, which alone has reached a level of Rs 16 billion.
KESC's tariff claim owed to it by Ministry of Finance has reached over Rs 16 billion. KESC has agreed to pledge this amount to Wapda against their payables. However, some other sources claimed that most of the demanded amounts of the company were the subsidy, what the KESC had applied for and the government was yet to decide whether the subsidy should be given or not.
They said the government was unlikely to approve the demanded subsidy as it has already allowed the company to increase the electricity tariff for three times last year. The company had increased the tariff in the months of April, July and October 2009. They further claimed the original dues the government owed to the company was not more than Rs 20 to 21 billion and the rest were the company's claim.