PESHAWAR, Jan 11: Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) has assured NWFP that it would release Rs1.5bn from the net hydel profit share of the province by Jan 15, official sources told Dawn here on Friday.

An assurance to this effect came at a meeting between the Wapda chairman Lt-Gen Zulfiqar and the NWFP governor Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah here on Friday.

The release of the first tranche of net hydel profit share would help provide a breathing fiscal space to the provincial government after it is faced with about Rs6bn budgetary deficit at the close of the first five months of the current financial year.

The shortfall includes Rs2.8bn under the direct federal transfers and Rs3bn under the net hydel profit share if it is calculated at the capped share amount of Rs6bn.

Official sources were confident that if the amount was released the province would come out of financial crisis at least for the time being.

After receiving Rs1.5bn the province would open up its net hydel profit account as the provincial government has not received any thing from Wapda on this count.

In line with the past practice — before army was inducted into Wapda — province should have received Rs3bn by Jan 15.

According to official sources, the issue of non-payment of net hydel profit to NWFP came under discussion during the Friday’s meeting between the provincial governor and the Wapda chairman.

The chairman, said the sources, was apprised about the difficulties the province was undergoing due to stoppage of funds by Wapda.

An official handout issued late in the evening on Friday also contained that the Wapda chairman assured the governor that the province would shortly receive its share on account of net hydel profit.

Apart from the contentious issue of net hydel profit, other issues including non-payment of electricity dues by the people of Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) was also dwelt upon in detail.

The meeting, contained the handout, observed that the system of recovering dues of Wapda in Fata was not organized and needed to be improved. It decided to link the grant of electricity connections to installation of meters in tribal areas.

Both the sides expressed resolve to expedite the process of installing meters in Fata where tribesmen are resisting government’s move of making them to pay electricity bills.

According to the official handout, the governor opposed the existing system of electricity charges collection in Fata and termed it injustice.

Tribesmen pay their monthly electricity bills at the time of purchasing bags of atta or sugar.

The governor observed that the existing system amounted to injustice as those who do not use electricity they too are subjected to pay electricity charges at flat rate, contained the official handout.

He directed the provincial authorities concerned to clear the electricity dues payable to Wapda by the provincial government’s departments.

In this respect, he said that the undisputed electricity dues should immediately be cleared and those on which the provincial authorities had some dispute with the Wapda should be set aside for the time being.