PESHAWAR, May 26: NWFP has questioned Wapda’s authority to make book adjustment of Rs1 billion against its net hydel profit share for the current financial year, according to officials.

Well-placed sources told Dawn that the provincial government had recently taken up the issue with the federal government in an official communique.

Wapda and the provincial government have been locked in dispute over the question of over Rs1 billion electricity arrears, the utility had claimed, were receivables from the provincial departments and local body institutions.

After the two sides failed to resolve the issue despite a recent reconciliation of their accounts, Wapda opted to recover the arrears through at source deduction a few days back.

Wapda made book adjustment of Rs1.081 billion against the NWFP’s account of net hydel profit payable during the financial year 2002-03.

Irked by the latest at source deduction — the highest in a single tranche of all the book adjustments made during the last couple of years — the NWFP government also took up the issue with Water and Power Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao.

The NWFP government has taken the stand that Wapda’s move came in contravention to directives issued by President Pervez Musharraf.

The president had issued instructions last year that Wapda’s arrears should not be recovered from the provinces through at source deduction.

Similarly, added the sources, the provincial government had also objected Wapda’s move on the ground that the legal authority to make book adjustments against federating units’ accounts rests with the federal government.

In this respect the provincial government in its communique to the federal authorities had also quoted relevant rules and provisions of law thereby, as per its stand, Wapda had no powers to make book adjustments against provinces’ accounts.

The sources said payment of net hydel profit to NWFP was covered under the constitution, hence, book adjustment in the name of recovering ‘disputed’ electricity arrears through at-source deduction (from the net profit share of the province) was in contradiction to the basic spirit of the constitutional provisions.