LAHORE  -  LESCO Lahore Electric Supply Compa­ny) is continuing with anti-power theft operation in all its circles of operation on fifth consecutive day (Monday) and detected 194 customers stealing elec­tricity, according to the company’s spokesman here. He added that LE­SCO has also submitted applications for registration of FIRs against all the electricity thieves in the respective police stations, out of which 97 FIRs (First Information Reports) have been registered and 25 suspects arrested. The LESCO raiding teams managed to detect one industrial, one agricultural, seven commercial and 185 domestic connections from where the respec­tive customers were stealing electric­ity. The company, he said, also charged 528,700 units to electricity thieves caught on the fifth day in the form of detection bill amounting to Rs 24.168 million after disconnecting all the con­nections. Also on the fifth day of opera­tion, he said, LESCO teams found some important figures involved in electric­ity theft. Following directives of Prime Minister and the Ministry of Energy (Power Division), he said, the LESCO Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Engineer Shahid Haider has launched massive operations against electricity thieves. The CEO is resolute to eliminate the evil of electricity theft from the LESCO region. The spokesman said that on fifth day of operation, LESCO charged 52840 detection units of Rs 2.959 mil­lion to Muhammad Younas (Chaanan Dyna Mill), 50966 detection units of Rs 2.854 million to Abdul Rauf having a commercial connection, 25907 units of Rs 569,954 to Muhammad Bilal, 5431 units worth Rs 325,872 to Shabir Ah­mad Liliani, 5303 units of Rs 265,150 to Kamran Madhulal, and 6270 units worth Rs 229,000 to Asghar Ali (Su­hana Service Station). The spokesman mentioned that a total of 1,273 con­nections were detected as stealing elec­tricity during five-day operation in LES­CO region. Out of 1272 FIR applications, 796 FIRs have so far been registered and 83 suspects arrested, he said, asserting that a total of 4,277,577 detection units worth Rs 181.028 million have been charged to all the electricity thieves. The LESCO CEO said that grand op­eration against electricity theft would continue without discrimination, and the LESCO officers/officials and field staff conniving in the power theft would also be taken to task.

FARMERS TO GET SUBSIDY UP TO 60PC ON PURCHASE OF MACHINERY

The Punjab government has sought applications from farmers of all dis­tricts to provide them agricultural machinery and equipment on subsidy. A spokesman of the department said on Monday that farmers would get a subsidy up to 60 percent and a maxi­mum of Rs 500,000 on purchase of ma­chinery. Regarding eligibility criteria spokesman said that a farmer should have a tractor of at least 50 horse pow­er and he must own or be a tenant of 25 acres of land in area of canal water and 50 acres of land in rain-fed area. He said, “Farmers are not allowed to sell or transfer machinery purchased under this project to any other person for 4 years.” Farmers have to get one day training from Assistant Agricul­ture Engineering of their respective district or from Assistant Director Ag­riculture Engineering regarding opera­tion of machinery, its look after and maintenance. Interested farmers could download application forms from field.agripunjab.gov.pk and submit till Sep­