Around Rs.17 m in fines from power pirates

Ridma Dissanayake

The Ceylon Electricity Board's (CEB) Special Investigations Unit has collected around Rs.17 million in fines imposed on power pirates during operations carried out throughout the island last month, Power and Energy Ministry sources announced yesterday.

This amount was made up of Rs.2.6 million as court fines and Rs.14.4 million as outstanding dues.

About 224 incidents of power piracy were reported and 159 were concerning electricity meter manipulations and 65 cases were for obtaining power using hooks. The Special Investigation Unit of the CEB has earned 213 million as fines imposed on power pirates during island wide operations carried out last year. This amount was made up of Rs.38.1 million as court fines and Rs.173.8 million as outstanding dues.

The ministry said the number of power pirates reported last year shows a drop over 50 percent when compared to 2011.

Over 8,550 incidents of power piracy were reported in 2011,which dropped to 3,569 last year.