TANDOJAM: Hyderabad Electric Supply Company has registered a power theft case against nine individuals, including a private line man, following a night raid in the residential colony of Agriculture University Tando Jam.
The suspects have not commented on the allegations.
The case was filed by SDO Hamza Manzoor Somro at Tando Jam police station.
According to the FIR, private line man Imran Sial was allegedly providing direct connections to residents, leading to large-scale power theft.
Those named in the case include Nizam Channa, Asif Kondhar, Rashid Khokhar, Ayaz Hussain, Hakim Ali Khaskheli, Ashfaq Ali, Muhammad Korail Bhatti and Shehzad Somro.
A similar case was registered against 14 individuals two days earlier during a previous Hesco operation in the same colony.
Two cases in the same locality within 72 hours, naming 23 individuals in total, points to a pattern the utility is treating as systematic rather than opportunistic.
Authorities have warned of strict action against those involved in illegal connections, and efforts to curb power theft are continuing.
The allegation that a private line man facilitated the connections is the central element of the case.
Direct connections — commonly known as kunda connections — require technical access to distribution infrastructure. Where an individual with line-work skills is alleged to be organising connections for multiple households, the utility’s case shifts from isolated pilferage to facilitated supply, which carries different evidentiary and legal weight.
The description of Sial as a “private” line man indicates he is not alleged to be a Hesco employee, a distinction that separates this case from the internal-collusion cases utilities periodically pursue against their own staff.
Distribution losses have become a central concern in Pakistan’s power sector, where the gap between electricity dispatched and electricity billed feeds directly into the circular debt that has constrained the sector for years.
Hesco has historically recorded among the higher loss percentages of the country’s distribution companies. Those losses are not solely theft — they include technical line losses and recovery shortfalls — but unmetered consumption is the component most amenable to enforcement action.
The cost is borne collectively. Losses that cannot be recovered from the point of consumption are absorbed through tariff determinations, meaning paying consumers underwrite unpaid consumption elsewhere on the network.
Direct connections also carry safety consequences. Unauthorised tapping bypasses protective equipment, raising the risk of electrocution and equipment fire, and contributes to transformer overloading that produces outages for legally connected households on the same feeder.
Night raids of the kind conducted in Tando Jam are the standard operational method, timed to capture connections in active use when load is highest and hooks are least likely to have been removed.
Cases registered under electricity theft provisions proceed through the criminal courts, with utilities separately empowered to raise detection bills for assessed unbilled consumption.
Hesco has indicated that operations in the area are ongoing.
Persons named in the FIR are accused, not convicted, and have not responded to the allegations.
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