The Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) has conceded that it is facing ‘stiff opposition' from agriculturists and hut-dwellers to meter their connections, though the Board is making “all efforts” to meter the connections.
This has been stated in the tariff order issued by the Tamil Nadu Electricity Regulatory Commission (TNERC) a week ago.
Going by estimates of TNEB officials, there are approximately 13 lakh hut connections and 19.8 lakh agricultural connections which are enjoying free power supply.
According to the TNEB'S calculations, energy consumption of the agricultural connections was 11,918 million units (MU) against the total net consumption of 56,698 MU during 2009-2010. Hut-dwellers had consumed 216 MU. In its response to a number of issues raised in the wake of the tariff revision petition filed in January with the TNERC, the Board stated that it acknowledged that metering all consumers' connections was important to ensure proper revenue recovery. As the entire process of metering the agricultural and hut services was “very vast and slow,'' the Board had been requesting the Commission to extend deadline from time to time.
The TNERC had granted time for another three years from October 1, 2009. The TNEB submitted that it had an action plan for speedy replacement of defective meters. By way of its views on the issue of metering in general, the Commission stated that the Board should work out a time-bound programme for 100 per cent metering and submit it to the TNERC. This should be done in six months from the date of issue of the tariff order (July 31, 2010).
Pointing out that it had also directed the Board to install meters on all feeders for conducting energy audit, the Commission mentioned that an estimate of the agricultural consumption was to be made by a scientific process. In its petition, the TNEB had stated that it had awarded a consultancy project to S.K. Raheja, former Director of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, for recommending analytical procedures and sample size assessment of energy consumption by unmetered farm and hut connections. At random, 6,600 farm and 4,620 hut connections were chosen and meters were installed. Meter readings were taken from December 1, 2006 to November 30, 2007. While analysing the data for energy consumption estimate, “run time error” had occurred in the software. The matter had been referred to Dr Raheja and the reply was awaited. But, the Commission said that it was unable to accept this explanation.
