Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is said to be in dilemma over hike of power tariff. The State government is yet to take a decision on the hike of power tariff though the extended deadline to submit the tariff proposals to the TS Electricity Regulatory Commission (TSERC) ends tomorrow.
The TS Transco which submitted the Aggregate Revenue Requirement (ARR), on behalf of Southern and Northern distribution companies, to the TSERC two months ago had delayed submitting the tariff proposals. It had taken time till January 31 to submit the proposals.
However, it did not submit the proposals on January 31 and sought time till February 15. The Transco has to inform TSERC whether it would propose to raise the tariff or would continue with the old rates. If it wants to hike the tariff, it has to submit the proposals for the consideration of TSERC. The ERC would hold public hearing on the proposals before giving its decision on the proposals.
As the power tariff would have its impact on more than one crore power consumers of the State, the government would have their say in determining the power tariff. Government has to specify the subsidy it would bear and other reliefs it could provide. Recently Telangana joined the UDAY scheme and signed a MoU with the Centre and agreed to take over the burden of debts of the power distribution companies (Discoms).
This has helped Discoms in getting a relief to the tune of Rs 12,000 crore debts. Still they need about Rs 8,000 crore to Rs 10,000 crore of revenue to narrow the gap between revenue and expenditure. The Discoms have no other way than raising the tariff and the same has been informed to the government.
However, the Chief Minister seems to be not showing interest to allow Discoms to hike the tariff particularly for the domestic consumers. According to sources, he wanted the Discoms to adjust with the revenue accruing from non-domestic consumers. He has reportedly told the Discoms to prepare tariff in a way that it would spares domestic consumers from the tariff hike burden.
