visakhapatnam private companies particularly cable tv firms have been directed to pay a rent to the stateowned ap eastern power distribution company ltd apepdcl for using the latters electric utility poles for their own operationsthe decision was taken to maintain uniform procedure discipline and accountability of the private players like cable operators hy dora chairman and managing director of apepdcl told toidora said that private cables are wired on electricity poles without proper authorization this often damages the poles obstructs electricity department service personnel in attending to faults or regular maintenance works disturbs power supply and obstructs traffic in cities like vizagaccordingly the discom will charge rs 50 per pole per month in municipality and corporation areas and rs 35 per pole per month in mandal levels a survey is being conducted to identify the number of cable tv operators in the five coastal districts dora said the implementation of the new service charge rule is likely to be from august 15 he added according to apepdcl sources there are 21 lakh electric poles in the five coastal districts srikakulam vizianagaram visakhapatnam and east and west godavari districts all these utility poles relate to an electricity network of 82000 km the discom supplies power connections to its own consumersin addition to the discoms usage private users like cable operators and others use the discoms power utility poles to spread their own network services the private users use nearly 90 of the 21 lakh poles in villages towns and vizag city the sources saidso far there was no difference between the discom and the private users for the service but the state has recently insisted on collection of user charges from private players for using power utility poleswe estimate that nearly rs 200rs 300 crore would be collected as user charge from the private users of our electric poles we have given deadline to all the cable operators t0 register themselves with the discom by august 10 we will hopefully implement the fee collection from august 15 dora said for their part cable operators say that while they are not worried about the rental charges the governments decision would indirectly affect customers who need to pay extra money to cable operator government takes money from us as rental charges we will collect the fee from customers by increasing the cable service charges said a cable operator on condition of anonymityk sai a resident of peda waltair said whatever the decisions taken by the government the ultimate loser is the common man