The demand to rollback the power tariff hike, which came into force with effect from September 1, was again raised by representatives of various residents welfare associations at a “Bijli Adalat” organised by former Union Minister Vijay Goel here on Thursday.
While representatives of a number of RWAs attended the meet, called to discuss the issue of power tariff hike, the officials of the private power distribution companies who had been invited to answer the queries of the people, preferred to stay away.
The meet was attended among others by MLAs Kulwant Rana, Mohan Singh, M.S. Bisht, Dr. S.C. L. Gupta and Ravinder Bansal and RWA experts Anil Sood and Rajiv Kakaria.
Mr. Goel said the power tariff hike decision was not only intolerable to the residents, but was also arbitrary since only last year the then Chairman of Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission had recommended a 25 per cent decrease in tariff. “It is very unfortunate that even after 35 per cent reduction of power theft, which DERC itself claims, the benefit has not been passed on to the citizens,” he said.
In the meeting, a comparison was also drawn between the power supplies by the discoms and New Delhi Municipal Corporation. The residents wondered why discoms were charging so much when NDMC was supplying power at Rs 1.80 per unit.
Holding the meet under the banner of social group Lok Abhiyan, the BJP national general secretary said all the RWAs of Delhi are united in their protest against the tariff hike. He asserted that DERC will be forced to withdraw its decision and demanded an audit of the accounts of the discoms by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India.
