Thursday, Oct 10, 2002
Thursday, Oct 10, 2002 |
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Kerala
By Our Special Correspondent
The Minister told mediapersons here today, that the financial problems of the Board were the results of mismanagement by the previous Government. Hence, the Opposition had no moral right to protest against the hike. Mr. Sivadasan recalled that the Board had taken loans totalling Rs. 4,434 crores during the LDF Government. Of this, only Rs. 3,071 crores was spent for projects. The rest was used for revenue expenditure. Now, debt servicing was the biggest burden of the Board, which had fallen into a debt trap. He said the tariff hike being effected from this month would increase the revenue of the Board to only Rs. 260 crores a month while the expenditure stood at Rs. 400 crores a month. Of the additional revenue of Rs. 35 crores from the hike, about Rs. 19.49 crores would come from the domestic sector and Rs. 13 crores from the industries sector. However, the realisation could be lower on account of reduced power consumption. Asked whether the Board would take steps to recover the excess amounts paid to employees during fixation of salaries, the Minister said that detection of errors in adding of the increments was a laborious process. The Government had directed the Board to start the effort. He maintained that consumers could not be allowed to replace faulty meters as they had been keeping their meters that way to suppress consumption. However, new consumers will be allowed to install their own meters. He said the Board has been reconstituted to induct C. Abdulla as member in place of Jacob Samuel who was retiring from the Board. He said that much of the arrears receivable by the Board would have to be written off. The Board was to get Rs. 128 crores from the private sector excluding cases on which there were court stays. However, much of this could not be realised as companies have closed down. He said that Rs. 460 crores was due from the Government technically. However, this was the result of book adjustment aimed at showing a profit for the Board. The Government would not be paying this amount. However, about Rs. 600 crores was due from Government departments and agencies as power charges. He said that one-time settlement had been permitted in the case of private agencies whose dues were less than Rs. 10,000. The interest rate had been halved to help them pay. He said that the normal increase in power charges would be effected only after formation of the Electricity Regulatory Commission.
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