The Helpful Neighbours

"Our latest power bill is for twenty-two thousand rupees!" I cried in shock. The bill showed a power consumption of 3,000 kWh. I was asked to pay within seven days to avoid disconnection.

"TWENTTY TTWO THHOUSANDD?" My wife repeated, putting emphasis on every syllable.

"Yes!" I responded weakly.

"But how can they raise the bill for such a huge amount? Isn't our flat-locked?" She exclaimed in disbelief. "Or, is someone illegally tapping power from our line?" The salvos were rapidly fired at me. 

Yes, I had switched off the mains and locked our flat before starting in November last year, but simply had no genie at my command to provide quick answers regarding the latest status there. Not only was I 2,200 kilometres away from home, but travel restrictions due to Covid had also forced us to extend our three-month trip to seven months with little hope for the resumption of flights in the next month. When a lot can happen over coffee, undoubtedly a lot more can happen in seven months—I thought.

I checked the April bill. And after that, the bills of March, February, and January. All had the same figure, 22079, against previous and current readings. But, the bill of May was different. It showed these readings as 22079 and 25079.

Illegal power tapping is neither uncommon nor impossible. It has been happening since time immemorial. Tapping of corporate power by the managing director's son, political power by the minister's wife, marketing vice president's power by the chief accountant, prime minister's power by the army chief ... the list is endless. Theft of electrical power is nothing in comparison.

The 'nothing' puzzled me. The probability of stealing exactly 3,000 units was as bleak as that of a monkey saying sorry to a boy after snatching a banana from him.

"Perhaps it is a case of incorrect meter reading," I mumbled.

"How can the meter be 'read' incorrectly? I mean, aren't they all electronically connected with little need for human intervention?" By then my son had joined the discussion.

"No, a man comes and notes down the readings every month," I explained.

"That is strange!"  

I can't really blame him. He has lived in Dubai far too long to remember how things run back home in India. And they run reasonably well till someone goofs up somewhere, as perhaps had happened in this case.

"Let me check with the other residents," I said. Yes, that was it! I must pass on this information to them. Perhaps everyone might have received inflated bills.

My immediate neighbour, Devi Prasad Nayak, responded almost instantly. No, he didn't provide a clue about the consumption of 3,000 units. Being a methodical insurance agent, he, instead, asked for a copy of the bill. Of course, how could any responsible person comment on the situation without ascertaining the facts?

I uploaded a copy of the bill in our common WhatsApp forum, and gave the good news to my wife that our immediate neighbour had decided to come to our rescue.

"See, he is a good man, after all! He had requested us to sit in his house when our door lock malfunctioned in 2017." She beamed.

"But you went to another neighbour while I went to fetch the locksmith," I refreshed her memory.

"He offered to buy milk for us at the beginning of the lockdown last year," she retorted. 

"But he never bought even a drop of it!" I added.

"Hmm, but has anyone else responded in the forum?" She asked.

"No, Nayak is the only one so far," I admitted.

Meanwhile, Nayak's inquisitiveness had risen further, "What was your previous bill amount? When did you pay it?"

There was no reason for me to feel offended. After all, he was trying to help me. So what if the consumption of 3,000 units in a month had nothing to do with the previous bills and payments!

I gave him the details.

"You will have to get the reading rechecked by the power corporation," he declared after a while.

"The corporation corrected the bill in a similar case when I showed a video clip of the meter in the past," I argued.

"Then approach the corporation on your return. Bribe some guy, and your work will be done!" Nayak provided the solution.

"But no passenger flights are operating between the two countries, and I don't know when I'll be able to return," I pleaded.

Losing interest in the conversation, Nayak had perhaps by then focused his energy on selling some insurance policy.

"What did Nayak say?" My wife asked.

"Nothing! He has gone silent. Exactly the way when we asked him to return the Rs.5,000 loaned to him seven years ago." I spoke with distaste.

"He used to climb into our balcony and steal the newspapers in our absence," she recalled.

"Though we have covered it with an iron grill and curtains now, I still sometimes notice him peeping into our balcony," I added.

Meanwhile, another neighbour, Jitendra Kochhar, jumped in the fray with a suggestion, "You can lodge a complaint on the power corporation website."

"Yes, but they would insist upon paying the bill by the due date. The inflated bill can be corrected only if a video clip of the meter is verified by the relevant official." I retorted.

The exchange with Kochhar continued for some time, first focusing on where I had gone, and then gradually shifting to the when's and the why's of it. Inflated billing took a backseat. Kochhar is in the business of education, and, I am sure, believes that strong fundamentals are necessary for progress in life with or without inflated bills. 

A day had passed without any progress.

"Madam, can you please check and confirm the meter reading?" Hesitatingly, I sent a direct message to Mrs. Braganza. Hesitatingly, because this 70-year-old cancer survivor falls in the high-risk group for Covid infection.

Hardly fifteen minutes would have passed when her reply came with a photograph of the meter. My suspicion was right! The meter displayed 22079. It was a simple case of incorrect noting of the second '2' as '5'. The bill could be corrected by showing a video clip of the meter to the power officials.

"Let me request the Kesaris. You taught their daughters free for several months. We took care of their fish on the two occasions they went to their ancestral home. We sometimes shared food." My wife was excited.

"I taught only the elder one. You taught the younger one, who never flushed the toilet after use and once peed on our sofa," I refreshed her memory.

"What else do you expect from a five-year-old?" She defended the girl.

"But Kesari has not responded to the communication so far," I interjected.

"Perhaps he is not comfortable writing on WhatsApp," now she was defending the girl's father.

"Okay!" I let her have her way. She recorded a message and sent it to Kesari.

Another day passed.

My wife kept checking her and my phones, but Kesari remained silent like a car with a stolen battery.              

"When you are serious, everything looks so tense!" My daughter-in-law observed during lunch.

"I am worried that if the power corporation is not able to depute a person to read the meter in the coming months, it may ask me to pay as per the current bill in future as well. That would force me to shell out Rs.22,000 every month without consuming a single unit of power," I croaked.

"Why don't you ask a neighbour to take a video and attach it to your complaint on the corporation's website?" She asked.

"I lodged the complaint yesterday, but the website has no provision for uploading a video file. Plus, I am yet to find a person willing to take a video clip of the meter," I was lost in thoughts.

"What about our front door neighbours, the Tandons?" She had enjoyed a good relationship with them seven years ago.

"I don't know them so well. And, though we share Diwali and Holi sweets every year, I ignored his demand for sharing our Wi-Fi password with them last year," I admitted with guilt.

"Hmm! What about 'Khad-Khad Bhaiya'?" She asked about a particular neighbour who is abnormally tall with an abnormally unpleasant voice. 

I suspected that she might have been pally with that neighbour's wife also seven years ago, but we fall in his mother's category who has not displayed any inclination to return our visits or appreciate our little gifts.

"He has not commented at all on the issue," I closed the topic.

"I will try and find a way out," she said.

I nodded, and started chewing my food.

"I will request Kesari again," my wife said.

She confided at night, "Mrs. Kesari has said that they are not getting out of the house due to Covid. We appear to be up against a wall!"

"You know, Manav Pandey wrote yesterday that he would try to help, but he, too, didn't communicate today," I murmured.

I visited the power corporation site the next morning. Unbelievably, the bill had been revised to Rs.686, and the payment date had been extended by ten days. Not taking a chance, I paid the bill immediately.

My phone had a message from Manav Pandey, expressing regret for not being able to communicate the previous day and informing that he had got the bill revised after showing the video.

Who says helpful neighbours don't exist anymore? They do. They just don't brag about it.