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Desa grilled over graft

JS sub-body formed to watch corruption

Staff Correspondent
A parliamentary body yesterday formed a subcommittee to identify the unbridled corruption in the Dhaka Electricity Supply Authority (Desa).
The parliamentary standing committee on power, energy and mineral resources ministry formed the subcommittee in response to lawmakers' demand for dissolution of the Desa and asked the probe body to submit its report in a month.
"We will go for action after receiving the recommendations from the parliamentary body," State Minister for Power Iqbal Hasan Mahmud told reporters after the meeting held at the Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban.
The government decided last July to convert the state-run Desa into a company for making the power-supply system in Dhaka more stable and effective. The decision was taken as part of the ongoing process of reforms in the power sector--a move largely prompted by persuasion of the same donors to the sector who had earlier prescribed the formation of the Desa.
The parliamentary body has been trying to curb corruption in the Desa since the last two years. However, it expressed frustration as a new system called Performance Target Achievement, which was introduced three months ago, also failed to curb the irregularities in the organisation.
Examining the documents provided by the Desa, the parliamentary watchdog yesterday observed that the Desa officials do not charge any bills for at least 40-50 lakh units of electricity each month at its 34 substations. This causes a loss of significant amount of money each month, which the Desa describes as system loss, the meeting sources said.
The members of the parliamentary body discussed the condition of two Desa substations in Narayanganj where officials did not prepare bills for an average 45 lakh units of electricity in the last three months despite introduction of the new system.
The documents disclosed that in Fatullah alone the Desa officials did not charge bills for 5,014,361 kwh (kilowatt hour) electricity in May and 4,952,303 kwh in June this year.
The average value of the lost electricity was Tk 16,296,673 in May and Tk 16,094,984 in June, according to the Desa documents.
The Desa sells each unit of electricity at Tk 2.5 to Tk 4.
The system losses of the Desa remained almost unchanged--even increased in some areas--while the Dhaka Electricity Supply Company reduced system losses from 46 percent to 14, observed the committee.
A senior official at the Power Development Board (PDB) said the Desa officials doubled their irregularities anticipating the possibility of dissolving the organisation.
Thus the corruption and irregularities in the Desa have eaten up about Tk 2,000 core in last ten years. At present, the Desa owes Tk 3,229 crore to the PDB while it has unpaid bills of Tk 1319 crore.
"Everyone from the top to bottom in this organisation are corrupt. We should think seriously whether the organisation should exist or turn in to a holding company," committee member and ruling BNP lawmaker Sardar Shakhawat Hossain Bakul told the reporters.
Committee Chairman Shahidul Islam told reporters at his office that the Desa officials earlier assured the committee that they had initiated steps to reduce system losses and realise the long pending bills. But instead of any improvement, the situation is deteriorating, he said.
"We asked the subcommittee to probe the irregularities and identify the officials involved in the malpractice," the committee chairman said. "The subcommittee was also asked to submit its report in a month, otherwise it will be dissolved."
On the ongoing load-shedding across the country, the lawmakers observed that it is not fair to reduce power supply to villages as the villagers regularly pay the electricity bills.
The state minister for power, however, told the committee that the situation is improving.
Awami League lawmaker and committee member Syed Abul Hossain declined to comment on the meeting discussion.