SHILLONG:
Power Minister Abu Taher Mondal, on Septmeber 8, said the mobile service providers have been asked to immediately clear their pending electricity bills to avoid disconnection.
“We are communicating with them (mobile service providers) that you should pay the bills immediately or else electricity will be disconnected. If they don’t pay the bills for long time, definitely we will disconnect,” Mondal told reporters.
These mobile service providers have erected mobile towers in around 200 sites across the state.
There are companies that operate more than one mobile tower such companies are paying only one tower and do not pay the amount for the other towers.
The minister informed that there are new requests coming to the government for connection but all these matters are being reviewed frequently.
When asked, Mondal however said that the department is exercising caution to ensure there is no problem as far as the mobile network is concerned in the state.
“Stern action can be taken immediately but the moment we disconnect electricity to all towers, you will see what is the situation as far as the network is concerned so we are taking both the sides into consideration that we should realised our bills and at the same time we should restrain from going for immediate disconnection of all mobile towers,” he said.
“Some organizations without paying have just run away so we are a little bit strict about that but then these mobile towers and communication people keep on pressurizing us to give new connections to new mobile towers. Therefore, we are pressurizing them to pay the bills so maybe some bills have been cleared,” he added.