The caretaker government said it has arrested nearly 500 persons while recovering over Rs950 million as the crackdown against power theft intensifies country-wide.

“Will cross first billion recovery mark today, although all nuts and bolts of the anti-theft campaign are still not fully in place,” Rashid Langrial, Secretary Power Division, shared in a post on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, on Thursday.

“Fully-evolved model by end of the month InshaAllah,” he added.

As per data shared by Langrial, the cumulative recovery has jumped from Rs14 million on September 07 to Rs951 million till September 14, while total number of persons arrested since September 07 is 490.

Earlier this month, Caretaker Minister for Energy, Power and Petroleum, Muhammad Ali on Wednesday said the government is working on the Electricity Theft Control Act to curb transmission and distribution (T&D) losses in the country.

The minister shared that Pakistan sustains annual losses to the tune of Rs589 billion due to electricity theft and non-bill payments.

Sharing the proposed solutions, the caretaker minister said intervention through technology will be done in areas where electricity theft is low, which includes the implementation of transformers and smart metering.

“In those areas, where loss is around 30-60%, we are considering involving management of the private sector. Whereas, enforcement measures would be taken in areas with over 60% losses, which consists of 2,085 feeders,” he added.