VIJAYAWADA: With complaints pouring in about malfunctioning of LED streetlights, the State government has put in place a new web-based ‘Perfect Complaint Reporting Mechanism (PCRM)’ at village-level to address repair and maintenance issues within 72 hours.
Village volunteers and secretaries will take the responsibility of ensuring rectification in coordination with the Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL) and AP State Energy Efficiency Development Corporation (APSEEDCO).
According to a statement from the APSEEDCO on Sunday, Panchayat Raj and Rural Development (PR and RD) Minister Peddireddy Ramachandra Reddy took stock of the outcome of a special drive held recently on LED streetlights.
Over 8.6 lakh complaints regarding malfunctioning of the streetlights in villages were registered between January and October this year.
On the occasion, the officials explained that village secretaries will enter complaints on faulty streetlights in a web portal after receiving information from village volunteers.
Every volunteer will look after around 50 electric poles and report to the secretary.
The EESL and its maintenance agencies will receive the complaints and rectify problems within 72 hours.
Panchayat secretaries will report feedback in the same web portal as and when the complaints are redressed.
They explained that the complaints in Chittoor district have come down to 9 per cent from 15 per cent and from 12 per cent to 7 per cent in Kadapa after the special drive was taken up.
The special drive has been extended to Visakhapatnam and East Godavari districts and will be taken up in all districts in a phased manner, the officials said.
To ascertain the rectification process done during the drive, Peddireddy told the officials that a third-party inspection would be initiated to assess the ground reality.
Commissioner of Panchayat Raj and Rural Development department Girija Shankar informed the minister that they were still receiving requests from gram panchayats for installation of lights even as 23.54 lakh were installed.
The minister directed the officials to submit a report on uncovered villages for taking up 100 per cent installation of streetlights.