Report of Indian Institute of Public Administration ... - Ministry of Power

Haryana
GENERATION
For capacity additions, the State seems to have limited options in view of its
geographic location and has to depend on power supply sources outside the State. In
tune with the power sector reform in the State, Yamuna Nagar Thermal Power Project
was taken up through IPP route, which for certain reasons did not fructify. Thus the
State lost precious time and has now tried to make up by focussing on optimising the
scope for installing additional capacity in the existing thermal power plant in Panipat.
The ABT regime is being misused in spirit by the States that are having surplus
generation. The regime has led to predatory pricing in the reverse sense. Haryana,
having tremendous shortages, has the Hobson choice, i.e., either to pay higher prices
to meet peak demand or resort to massive load shedding. The phenomena of high
spikes in prices caused by exploitation of ABT regime is similar to what happened in
power crisis in California during 2000-01. The issue of unfair prices needs to be
addressed by CERC and/or MoP.
DISTRIBUTION
While distribution holds the key to reforms in the power sector, the investments to
bring about the reforms have been focussed on the generation and transmission sector
in Haryana. The investment in distribution sector during the entire post-restructuring
period has been around only 21 per cent of the total investments made in the State
power sector. This was far below the projected level of investments, which were
estimated for distribution sector as envisaged.
The problem of widespread nature of electricity thefts and vested interests seems
difficult to be solved since the utilities, which are Government owned, have a little
motivation in making a drastic dent into these malpractices. There is strong evidence
that lack of effective governance in terms of support of the Government machinery
and sustained enforcement by the utilities; the theft of electricity by large consumers
and persons with vested interests cannot be solved. Therefore elimination of electricity
thefts should be taken up aggressively with the support of the State machinery at all
levels, as rampant thefts of electricity will negate other efficiency measure undertaken
by the Utilities.
A reversal of trends has been observed with DISCOMs reporting a profit of Rs 70
crore in 2003-04 against a loss of Rs 414 crore in 1999-2000. In 2004-05, the
DISCOMs again reported a loss of around Rs 397 crore, which reflects that the
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