The Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) board of directors has finally decided to restore power to several industrial firms that have defaulted on electricity bills. The decision was made in a meeting on Tuesday, following a Cabinet instruction on Sunday to resume power supply, which was cut off on October 24 over longstanding unpaid bills.

Earlier, on Monday, the NEA board, chaired by Energy Minister Deepak Khadka, had been unable to reach a decision to restore power to the firms, as several board members were absent, leading to a lack of quorum.

Meanwhile, challenging the Cabinet’s decision to reconnect power to the firms, advocate Shiva Rai, Komalnath Koirala and others filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court on Tuesday.

“A preliminary hearing of the petition will start on Wednesday,” Govinda Prasad Ghimire, information officer at the Supreme Court, told the Post.

According to an official privy to the developments at the NEA board meeting on Tuesday, the board also decided to collect dues.

“The board meeting has decided to implement the Cabinet’s decision, and it has also decided that the NEA will collect over Rs6 billion rupees from the industrial firms within 15 days, as instructed by Sunday’s Cabinet meeting,” Suresh Acharya, a secretary at the Ministry of Energy, Water Resources, and Irrigation, told the Post.

The board meeting on Monday had ended without a decision after it failed to meet quorum, as only four of eight board members attended. At least five members are required to achieve quorum.

According to a source at the NEA, only four of eight board members were present at Monday’s meeting.

In response to the Cabinet decision, the Employee Welfare Council of the NEA protested on Monday, arguing that restoring power supply to the defaulting industrial firms would cause harm to the institution.

According to the NEA, the firms owe between Rs8.25 billion and Rs6.65 billion-plus a 25 percent fine. Initially, the NEA had estimated that the firms that used exclusive feeders and trunk lines owed around Rs22 billion, but this amount was adjusted on the advice of a government-appointed commission set up to resolve the dispute.

The dispute is over the use of electricity through dedicated and trunk lines from July 2015 to June 2020. The government had made special arrangements to supply power to industrial firms even as the country faced several hours of daily power cuts.

Meanwhile, the Executive Director of Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) Kulman Ghising has failed to submit the clarification sought by the Ministry of Energy, Water Resources, and Irrigation for the second time.

When Ghising missed the initial 15-day deadline of October 23 to provide a 15-point explanation sought by the ministry, the ministry gave him another seven days on October 29. But by Tuesday’s office hours, no explanation had been received.

“Earlier, Ghising had failed to submit his explanation despite seeking additional time,” an official at the Ministry for Energy, Water Resources, and Irrigation told the Post. “As of Tuesday’s office hours, no explanation letter from Ghising has been received.”

The Post could not reach Ghising for his comments despite multiple phone calls and text messages.

In the clarification letter sent to Ghising, the ministry sought details about storekeepers who had worked in the NEA for the past five years, details of the foreign trips by board members, including total expenses, and details of agreements made with various neighbouring countries over the last four years, among other details.

Despite a warning from the government against disconnecting power supply to the firms, Ghising went ahead and cut the electricity on October 24, defying the government’s directive. The action has intensified the ongoing conflict between Ghising and the government.

According to the NEA, at least 14 of 34 industrialists, including two government-owned cement factories, paid their installments after the NEA disconnected the power supply. The supply was restored when the payments were made.

The Cabinet meeting held on Sunday also made three decisions related to the NEA. Besides ordering the authority to restore power to the firms within 24 hours, it also decided to implement the recommendations of the Lal Commission report and collect the overdue tariffs within 15 days based on the readings from time of day (TOD) meters.