Bowing to the demands of the opposition political parties, the Orissa governmenttoday decided to file a petition with the Orissa Electricity Regulatory Commission (OERC) for review of its order to increasepower tariff in the state.
OERC, through a notification on Friday, had increased the power tariff for all segment of consumers barring agriculture and below poverty line (BPL) families by an average of 19.74 per cent.
However, the hike was most severe on the domestic consumers who were subjected to atariffincrease of 40 percent.
The opposition, through an adjournment motion in the assembly, todayseverely criticised the government for this steep increase in power tariff and demanded that the government should ask for a review of the OERC order on the issue.
Replying to the motion in the assembly, the state energy minister Atanu Sabyasachi Nayak said, the government was not in favour of any steep increase in the power tariff. But the OERC, after considering all the revenue and loss aspects of the power system in the state, had gone for an increase in the tariff rates.
He said, the transmission and distribution loss in the state is around 39 percent which needs to be brought down immediately through system improvement.
Stating that Orissa has not got a single rupee from APDRP scheme of the Central government in last three years, he said, the state government has formed a capex fund of its own toremove infrastructural bottlenecks in system improvement. Besides, the governmentalso plans to crack the whip on theprivate distribution firms, three of them owned by Reliance Energy, to invest more on system improvement.
The minister blamed the Centre and Coal India for increasing the coal prices which has pushed up the cost of power generation. He said, the stateis nowdependent more on thermal power than hydel power and risinggeneration cost has necessiated to go for tariff increase. Giving an overview ofeconomics of power distribution, he said, Gridco, the bulk purchaser of power in the state is buying power at an average of Rs 3.22 per unit and selling it to the distribution companies at Rs 2.31 per unit.
However, keeping in view the steep hike in tariff of domestic sonsumers, the government has decided to seek a review of the tariff increase before OERC, the minister added.
As per the revised tariff, which will come into effect from April 1, the consumers now have to pay Rs. 1.40 per unit for the first 50 units, instead of first 100 units as proviosioned earlier.
Domestic consumers using electricity upto 200 units will now have to pay Rs 3.50 per unit while for consumption of between 200 and 400 units, the tariff will be Rs 4.30 per unit. Consumers using above 400 units would be charged at the rate of Rs 4.80 per unit, according to the OERC recommendation.
Earlier, consumers had to pay Rs. 3.10 per units to use upto 200 unit and Rs 4.10 for above 200 unit consumption.
The OERC had recommended hike in power tariff by 90 paise per unit to Rs 1.30 per unit for industrial users.
The regulator , however, did not make any changes to electricity tariff for BPL families and agriculture sector.
