GRU Reads the Wrong Meter for Decades

Funny thing, a couple of days ago a friend of mine was telling me about a problem he had with his house in the student ghetto.

He had a water leak in the house. When he went outside to shut off the meter, the water in the house did not stop running.

His meter was on the edge of his property. He was suspicious, so he searched around. Overgrown with grass and buried beneath a layer of dirt was another meter box. Seemingly not opened for decades, he dug out the cover and turned off the valve and the water in his house stopped flowing.

This was his meter box. What had GRU been reading?