Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company Limited has started a drive to disconnect gas lines of about 20,000 customers in the Dhaka metropolitan area – to realise Tk 400 crore bills that are due. “We started the drive since September this year. From today, the drive will be conducted mainly in Gulshan, Banani, Tejgaon, Nakhalpara, Tejkunipara and Badda areas under Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC),” Rashidul Alam, general manager (revenue) of Titas Gas, told UNB.
Thirty Titas Gas teams are now engaged in the drive against default consumers, he added. He informed that Titas has a total of 600,000 consumers under six zones in Dhaka metropolitan city. The zones are: Kuril, Motijheel-1, Motijheel-2, Tikatuli, Sobhanbagh and Mirpur. About 20,000 consumers have failed to pay the bills in time – with each zone having 3,000-3,500 defaulting consumers.
“Most of these are household gas connections,” said Rashidul Hasan, adding that if the defaulting consumers pay their arrear bills within a specific date, Titas will restore their connections. Titas officials said they have been issuing notices to the defaulting consumers for a long time to pay their respective outstanding bills. But many consumers are still not heeding to the notices.
Titas Gas has a total of 2.8 million consumers across its command areas – mainly in greater Dhaka and Mymensingh, according to officials. Dhaka, Narayanganj, Gazipur, Narsingdi, Munshiganj, Manikganj, Mymensingh, Tangail, Sherpur, Jamalpur are in the Titas areas. Officials of Titas said that there are a huge number of illegal gas connections in Dhaka, Narayanganj, Gazipur and Munshiganj areas.
“These illegal gas connections could be over 300,000 in Titas areas, although the exact number could not be confirmed,” Rashidul Hasan said.
