To talk about the problem of higher electricity bills, the temporary Prime Minister, Anwar-ul-Haq Kakar, has called for a sudden meeting. This meeting will happen at the Prime Minister’s House tomorrow.
During this meeting, people from the Ministry of Energy (Power Division) and the companies that give out electricity will give short presentations. This information comes from a message the Prime Minister posted on a small blogging website called X, which people also call Twitter.
Kakar said they will talk about how to help people who got really high electricity bills. The electricity cost went up and many people got very mad. They protested in big cities like Karachi, Rawalpindi, Multan, Gujranwala, and Peshawar.
In Karachi, a group called Jamaat-e-Islami protested in many places. They were upset about how much money people had to pay for electricity, especially from K-Electric.
In Rawalpindi, people gathered at Committee Chowk. They burned their electricity bills and asked the government to stop adding extra money as taxes.
In Peshawar, protesters said the higher electricity bills were too much. They asked the government for help.
In Gujranwala, protesters went to the Gujranwala Electric Power Company office. They were angry because electricity cost too much and they wanted to show it.
People in different cities like Narowal, Attock, Sargodha, and Haripur also held protests because they were not happy with the expensive electricity bills.
In July, the government agreed to make electricity cost a lot more, like Rs7.50 extra for each unit of electricity. The normal cost for electricity, as decided by the people who control it (Nepra), is Rs4.96.
The people who control electricity decided to make it more expensive so that they can get more money to cover the losses of electricity companies (Discos) this year.
They said that for the 2023-24 year, the average cost for electricity would be Rs29.78 for each unit. This is much higher than the old average cost, which was Rs24.82.
They gave reasons for this increase, like the value of money going down, prices going up, more power being made, and not a lot of power being sold. But one big reason for the increase is that the International Money People (IMF) wanted these changes to happen.
And remember, the actual cost of electricity will be even higher when they add more charges, taxes, duties, and other stuff each month and every three months.
