A campaign is being run in Ghazipur district to recover the outstanding electricity dues. During this, a case of assault on departmental officers and employees has come to light. The video of this incident has gone viral on social media. Another picture of the ill-treatment meted out to electricity officials doing their work has come to the fore.
In Mir Rai village of Nagsar, Sub-Divisional Officer Praveen Maurya and Junior Engineer Ashish Yadav were checking under the One Time Settlement Scheme (OTS) to recover electricity bills from the defaulters. During this, the work of cutting illegal connections was also being done. When the officers cut off the electricity of some defaulters, they lost their temper. The accused beat up the departmental employees. The defaulters not only beat up the officers and employees but also beat up the regional lineman Mahadev badly. Due to which he got injured.
During this incident, the mobile of the junior engineer was snatched. He was also misbehaved with. The Sub-Divisional Officer was also misbehaved with and his mobile was snatched and thrown away. The accused did not stop here, they also tore the government documents.
As soon as the information about the incident was received, Executive Engineer Gopichand Bhaskar reached the spot and inquired about the incident. Police also reached the spot and detained Mrityunjay Rai, Ramavatar Rai and Parshuram Rai on charges of obstructing government work and assaulting employees. While two other accused, Madan Rai and Rohit Rai, are absconding.
Junior Engineer Ashish Yadav has lodged a complaint with the police regarding this incident. Ashish Yadav has alleged in the complaint that the defaulters of the village obstructed government work, assaulted the employees and attacked the lineman with intent to kill. In Ghazipur district, 3,62,119 consumers have electricity bills worth Rs 591 crore pending. To recover this, the government is running the OTS scheme. In December, Rs 42.17 crore was recovered under this scheme.