ISLAMABAD, Dec 19: A frustrated Islamabad Electric Supply Company (Iesco) Friday began cutting off power supply to big consumers who have not paid their electricity bills, starting with the Capital Development Authority (CDA).

Supply to CDA’s municipal administration and fire department located next to Iesco headquarters was switched off as the CDA owes Iesco Rs241.88 million in unpaid bills.

An Iesco statement said it had 36 other major defaulters in the State, commercial, industrial and domestic sectors on its disconnection list.

Work suffered in the Islamabad municipal administration and fire brigade station because of the power outage.

“It is unfortunate that CDA has money to purchase fire engines each costing Rs350 million but cannot pay its much smaller power bill,” a low ranking official of the CDA said on condition of anonymity.

Iesco says the two cantonment boards of Rawalpindi together owe it Rs237.37 million in unpaid bills.

Among the government defaulters, APP news agency put on top the Pakistan Secretariat, through Public Works Department, with Rs29,563 million and the Murree tehsil municipal administration with Rs5,916 million.

Other major defaulters were the Azad Jammu and Kashmir government and the Military Engineering Service (MES) owing Rs1,804.27 million and Rs94.48 million respectively.

Iesco has issued a list of 37 defaulters. It includes six institutions of the armed forces, with total outstanding dues of Rs144 million. They are: MES, Armed Forces Institute of Cardiology (AFIC), Defence Production Division, Frontier Works Organisation (FWO), National Logistic Corporation (NLC) and Pakistan Ordnance Factories (POF).

Four Punjab government departments have also been declared defaulters, owing a total of Rs19.02 million. They are: Punjab Jail and Convict Settlement, Punjab Police, Punjab House Islamabad and Punjab PWD.

The federal government has defaulted to pay Rs62.52 million to Iesco for its six institutions. They are Pakistan Secretariat, ministries of health and industries, Islamabad Police, Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation and federal government hospitals.

Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission has Rs8.40 million in arrears, Airport Security Force, Rs1.35 million; PIA, Rs1.63 million; District Government Rawalpindi, Rs.174 million; district and tehsil headquarters hospital Rawalpindi, Rs2.61 million; Balochistan House, Rs2.4 million; PTCL, Rs7.06 million; Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA), Rawal Town, Rs47.62 million; TMA Murree, Rs6 million and TMA Talagang, Rs1.16 million.

It may be recalled that Federal Minister for Water and Power Raja Pervez Ashraf had given a one-month deadline to Iesco to recover its dues from government, semi-government, private and domestic consumers and to achieve the target of receiving all running bills and recovering Rs1 billion from defaulters.

However, after failing to recover the amount, Iesco’s performance registered a decline in November which forced the federal minister and the Pakistan Electric Power Company (Pepco) to snub the company’s management for its poor performance.