PESHAWAR, Sept 10: The NWFP government has asked the Peshawar Electric Supply Company (Pesco) to issue monthly electricity bills in the name of provincial public sector employees having official residences, sources said.

A request to this effect was made recently to Pesco after the provincial government found that even some senior civil servants were misusing the electricity facility at their official residences.

The provincial government has a total of about 23,000 electricity connections, including thousands provided to official accommodations and residences.

It has been found in several instances that employees were making the public exchequer to pay monthly electricity bills of their official residences and accommodations.

Pesco has issued special codes to each of the provincial public sector departments and their attached wings.

Monthly electricity bills to the public sector consumers - other than residences and other accommodations allotted to government employees - are issued in accordance with the codes.

However, the government came to know recently that several employees were being issued monthly electricity bills of their official quarters and bungalows against the codes assigned to their departments.

"The bills sent to them were not in their names. Instead, they contained the codes allotted to government departments and public sector entities," said a senior official.

"In this way, the government was bearing the cost of electricity consumed in their homes," he added.

In a few cases, senior police officers and civil servants based in various district headquarters were also found involved in misusing the facility, the sources said.

"In one case, a judicial official based at the headquarters of a district adjoining Peshawar was also found involved in power pilferage," said the official.

The judicial official threatened to take action against the field staff of the power company when the matter was taken up by senior Pesco staff, said the sources.

On coming to know the scale of misuse, the provincial government departments were issued instructions to make their employees 'behave', said the sources. Instructions have been issued to heads of all departments to make their employees avoid misuse of the facility.

The government has taken certain measures to make its employees pay their electricity bills from their own pocket.

Every employee transferred from one place to another would have to provide 'electricity clearance certificate' before payment of last month's salary.