October 18, 2008	Saturday	Shawwal 18, 1429

PESHAWAR, Oct 17: Pay water charges or water supply to your house will be disconnected and sewerage system will be blocked, threatens a notice issued by the City Development and Municipal Department (CD&MD) in a desperate move to recover outstanding dues in the provincial capital.

Notices for disconnection of water supply were being issued to many households in Hayatabad in the last two months but many did not pay the charges outstanding against them on account of water charges, officials complained. However, the people residing in rented houses in Hayatabad complained that they could not pay the dues left unpaid by the previous tenants.

“I have received this notice for the third time, but how can I pay a huge amount of years as water charges when I just rented the house recently,” said a resident of Hayatabad Township who was reluctant to pay the water bills.

A concerned official of the CD&MD said that they had to threaten the residents of Hayatabad with such notices as majority of them especially Phase-5 housing government officials did not pay the water bills. “The government officers living in Phase-5 want the best of services but they don’t pay water bills,” complained the official.

The official informed that outstanding dues against the residents of Phase-5 only on account of water charges had reached to Rs3,000,000 in a period of about 12 years. The rest of households in Hayatabad had to pay about Rs500,000.

The government deducts a certain amount every month from the salaries of the government officials but they had not transferred that amount to the CD&MD so far.

“We have requested to the state officers of the government not to check if there were any outstanding dues against the official residents before allotting to another official but they don’t pay any heed to it. Majority is not ready to pay the dues outstanding for years,” the official added.

When asked if such threatening notices were working, the official said that they had to threaten consumers with blockade of their sewerage system, which although seemed funny but was working. The Hayatabad Medical Complex had recently paid Rs1,800,000 outstanding for about ten years against them on account of water charges. There are more than 14,000 water connections all over Hayatabad Township. “The water rates are from Rs50-125 per month only, but even then people don’t pay these charges.