Aiming at detecting and disconnecting all illegal lines, Titas decided to conduct drives on all residences in the city by April 20, but the deadline has been extended till May 15.

An announcement stated that domestic consumers would be given an opportunity to regularise illegal lines and pay for the burners used, without any extra charges or penalties.

A total of 28,000 such irregularities have been straightened from the time of the announcement in March till now.

A number of vigilance teams from Titas have been simultaneously conducting the drive in the city.

Titas authorities said that last year during a similar drive they found many houses using the four-burner stove plus oven but paid for only the conventional a two-burner stove.

Selima Akhter, a housewife from Gulshan said that the announcement has not been well advertised.

"I know a lot of residents who were spared because they bribed the Titas employees and those conducting the drive, and ended up paying for two burners instead of the four-burners they were using," Selima said.

Another resident Abdur Rahim was quite unhappy about disconnecting illegal gas lines without Titas ensuring a proper supply of gas for day-to-day use.

He said that three weeks back they did not have a sufficient supply of gas for cooking.

Under the drive, illegal gas connections used for commercial purposes would be instantly disconnected and the fraudulent gas connection holders will be brought to justice, Titas sources said, adding that the special drive would help reduce gas pilferage that has been causing huge losses to the country for a long period of time.

Between the end of last year and beginning of 2006, Titas conducted drives against illegal connections and meters in the industrial areas surrounding the city and disconnected 250 connections.

The company was able to raise around Tk nine crore in penalties from these industries in Dhaka and from the surrounding areas like Savar, Tongi, Gazipur, Nayaranganj, and Fatullah.

The government has been incurring losses between Tk 200 to 250 crores, every year due to pilferage, popularly termed as 'system loss'.

Titas authorities admitted that a section of unscrupulous officials and employees are responsible for such pilferage and illegal connections as many of the approximately existing eleven lac consumers within the company's distributing area are bribing these employees to use these illegal lines.