The National Assembly was told on Friday that a total amount of Rs. 36.87 billion has been collected by Pakistan Television (PTV) from electricity consumers as television license fee through electricity bills in the last five years.
In 2017-18, an amount of Rs. 6.87 billion was collected from electricity consumers. PEPCO collected Rs. 6.12 billion from consumers while K-Electric collected Rs. 0.74 billion.
An amount of Rs. 7.52 billion was collected in 2018-19, from which PEPCO collected Rs. 6.66 billion in bills from consumers while K Electric collected Rs. 0.86 billion.
During the fiscal year 2019-20, Rs. 7.33 billion were collected. The share of PEPCO stood at Rs. 6.48 billion whereas the share of K-Electric stood at Rs. 0.85 billion.
In 2020-21 Rs. 9 billion were collected from consumers. PEPCO collected an amount of Rs. 8 billion from consumers while K-Electric collected Rs. 0.99 billion.
During the current fiscal year, an amount of Rs. 5.94 billion has been collected from electricity consumers till February 22, 2021. PEPCO has collected Rs. 5.2 billion from consumers while K-Electric has collected Rs 0.7 billion during the period.
People since the last two decades have switched to cable TV and no longer watch PTV. The only justification for collecting TVL fee is for Radio Pakistan because people listen to the radio in the cars.