The Kerala State Electricity Regulatory Commission will hear stakeholders on Monday on truing up of accounts submitted by the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) for 2019-20 and 2020-21. The hearing, which includes consideration of petitions submitted before the commission by stakeholders, will be held at the PWD Rest House at Pathadippalam, near Edappally, from 11 a.m.
Truing up of accounts is the finalisation of details of revenue and expenditure of the KSEB for the said financial years. Public can participate in the hearing.
For the financial year 2020-21, the board has claimed an aggregate revenue requirement as ₹15,403 crore and the expected revenue from charges as ₹14,661 crore, leaving a gap of nearly ₹742 crore.
For the financial year 2019-20, the KSEB has projected an aggregate revenue requirement of nearly ₹15,124 crore and expected revenue from charges of ₹14,571 crore, which leaves a gap of over ₹553 crore.
Call for better service
Meanwhile, Kerala High Tension and Extra High Tension Industrial Electricity Consumers Association, in a petition submitted earlier this month to the commission, claimed that while the KSEB had proposed pay revision, it must be linked to improvement in service efficiency.
Industrial consumers asked how a “loss-making entity” could continue to reward its employees by paying “ever-increasing salaries, when the salaries are already the highest in the country and one of the key reasons for the high losses incurred by the KSEB.”
Industrial consumers also claimed that the KSEB was understating its employee expenses, and that the real scale of employee expense was much higher than what has been declared by the board. They also blamed the rising and financially unviable employee cost as one of the key reasons for the losses being incurred by the board.
The power regulatory commission had, earlier this month, conducted hearing on a petition by the KSEB for continuous power charges increased between 2022 and 2027. The board has projected an expense of ₹18,829 crore during 2022 and ₹23,382 crore during 2027, while the revenue is projected at ₹15,976 crore and ₹18,203 crore respectively.
