MGVCL cuts supply to streetlights in Godhra

Vadodara: Streets in Godhra turned dark since Thursday night after the cash-strapped municipality failed to clear long-due electricity bills. Even though the civic body had been paying the mounting dues in small instalments, the MGVCL decided to discontinue power supply for city’s streetlights in around 10 areas. Interestingly, the civic body owes MGVCL around Rs 77 lakh towards streetlighting alone, while the total power dues have mounted to Rs 8.4 crore.Municipality president Sanjay Soni said that to ensure streetlight power supply was restored, they had earlier paid MGVCL Rs 15 lakh. “We then gave another cheque of Rs 5 lakh payable on Monday to ensure that streetlights power supply is restored,” he said.Soni added that the civic body was struggling to make ends meet and added that its condition was similar to some other municipalities. According to Soni, the municipality was trying to recover pending property taxes to ensure it had some income to pay off the dues.