Mangaluru: MN Compu Solutions, the  private agency – which issues water bills to the consumers on behalf of Mangaluru City Corporation – has terminated one of its employees, who was found tampering with the water meter and issuing ‘manipulated’ bill to the consumer.

On February 10, Dr. Deepak D’Souza, a member of Dakshina Kannada Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) unit had video captured an agency employee – identified as Mohammed Taufiq – engaging in tampering with the water meter and fixing it back intact before issuing bills.  The story was first broken on Newskarnataka.com – Read the story here.

An official in-charge of MN Compu Solutions told NewsKarnataka.com that they immediately informed the police in writing and Toufiq too surrendered before the Mangaluru East police. It’s a very serious issue. Hence, we have terminated him from the job”, he said.

The official also appreciated Dr. Deepak D’Souza for bringing such an illegal practice to their notice. “There are 35 employees who are assigned for the water meter reading task. This incident has sent a clear message to them”.

He also said that we have appointed a few observers to keep an eye on all the water meter readers. Besides, we are using software, which does not show the previous reading to the employee assigned for water meter reading. Hence, there is no scope for manipulation, he added.

Automatic Meter Reader

Naresh Shenoy, Executive Engineer, Mangaluru City Corporation said that the MCC will shortly install at least 10 Automatic Meter Reader (AMR), which automatically collects consumption, diagnostics, and status data from water meter and transfers that data to a central database.

Including software, MCC will spend nearly Rs 10 lakh for the installation of AMR. It will be installed in places where the consumption is more such as malls and industries. It will highlight any form of tampering the water meter, he said.

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