07 March 2004	Sunday	15 Muharram 1425

PESHAWAR, March 6: Four more district governments of NWFP have laid claim of Rs100 million against Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) as a result of excess billing, according to official sources.

The Peshawar city district government, Lakki Marwat district government, Mansehra district government and Bannu district government have prepared cases of excess billing by Wapda involving a total amount of Rs100 million.

The NWFP government and Wapda, according to sources, are in the process of reconciling the accounts of the four more district governments and the Authority to sort out disputes over the excess payment issue.

"The validity of the said district governments' claim against Wapda would be known once their accounts are reconciled with Wapda," said a source.

In an identical exercise, carried out recently, Wapda was found to have overcharged about Rs106 million to four other district governments of the province - Abbottabad, Charsadda, Mardan and Karak district governments.

As a result of reconciliation of accounts, it was established that Abbottabad district government was overcharged an amount of over Rs30 million, Mardan slightly over Rs12 million, Karak over Rs50 million and Charsadda about Rs7 million.

"Cases involving another amount of Rs100 million are under process and the parties concerned are busy to reconcile their accounts to resolve disputes," said a senior officer closely associated with the reconciliation exercise.

Sources said the district governments of Peshawar and Lakki Marwat, whose cases are under process, had put up strong cases of having been overcharged by Wapda.

The NWFP and Wapda agreed to reconcile their accounts to resolve their disputes over the billing issue pertaining to the last couple of years.

While Wapda has been laying claim to arrears involving hundreds of millions of rupees accumulated against the provincial public sector consumers, the NWFP has been accusing the Authority of excess billing to its public sector entities.

The province, said the sources, had a cumulative claim of over Rs2.5 billion against Wapda for the financial years of 1995-96 and 1996-97.

However, added the sources, the current reconciliation drive was not covering that period.

"Even if the province manages to get its accounts reconciled with Wapda for the last couple of years it would benefit from the exercise as appears to be the case after reconciling the accounts of four districts which showed that Wapda overcharged over Rs100 million during a span of one or two years," said the source.

The provincial government, led by then chief minister Mehtab Ahmed Khan, had also submitted a claim, in the form of a formal report, to the then federal government for the purpose of forcing Wapda to adjust the amount (Rs2.5 billion) against the accounts of the provincial public sector entities who were allegedly sent excess bills.

The matter, said the sources, still remained to be resolved between the two sides after none of the successive federal governments took the provincial government's case seriously.

Sources said the two sides, Wapda and the NWFP, had plans to extend the scope of the reconciliation drive to other districts in the months to come after reconciling Wapda's accounts with those of the districts of Lakki Marwat, Peshawar, Bannu and Mansehra.