BENGALURU: Come May 1, consumers under the Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Ltd (BESCOM) limits will have to cough up an additional 56 paise per unit for power, irrespective of the type of consumers.
For the first time in the state, the Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC) on Friday announced the true-up or top-up charges for all escoms, revising the power tariff with effect from the April billing cycle, but that will reflect in bills to be issued in May. As per KERC orders, Bescom consumers will pay the highest amount, followed by CESC (Mysuru) consumers at 15 paise per unit.
KERC stated that consumers in the MESCOM (Mangaluru) jurisdiction will get a refund of 9 paise per unit. Similarly, consumers in HESCOM (Hubballi) and GESCOM (Kalaburagi) will get a refund of 10 paise per unit. Consumers under the Hukkeri Rural Electric Corporation Society will get the highest refund of 155 paise per unit.
Bescom’s jurisdiction spreads across Bengaluru Urban, Bengaluru Rural, Chikkaballapur, Kolar, Davanagere, Tumakuru, Chitradurga and Ramanagara districts.
KERC in March 2025 had announced a 7% hike in electricity bills and reduced the fixed charges by Rs 25 across the board. It had then frozen the revision for the next three financial years, but allowed true-up charges. It had also included a 36 paise per unit pension and gratuity surcharge (government’s contribution) which was announced on March 19, 2025. This surcharge, apart from the hike and refund, will continue to be collected from consumers this financial year. It will, however, be revised to 35 paise per unit in FY 2027 and 34 paise in FY 2028.
The tariff revision left consumers agitated. Muralidhar Rao, a citizen and power activist, said monopoly and mismanagement at Bescom is making consumers pay more.
“It is about time Bengaluru is separated from other tier-2 cities and rural areas, because there are no IP sets in Bengaluru city.
The government should also look at adopting the public-private partnership (PPP) model for other cities for power supply. Privatisation will ensure affordable and efficient power supply. It should also be decentralised,” he said.
Power expert MG Prabhakar said account books close on March 31. Advance taxes have already been paid. The revision now will hike the production cost, which will lead to losses to industrial and commercial consumers. The hike in power tariff will also burden domestic consumers, he added.
Defending the revision, a senior Bescom official, not wanting to be named, said, “It is not a hike, but a difference of 56 paise per unit that has to be collected from consumers towards revenue deficit for 2024-25 FY. We had appealed to KERC to address the revenue deficit of Rs 2,800 crore, which would have been an additional charge of 80 paise per unit. But KERC accounted for a deficit of Rs 2,068 crore, and consumers will bear an additional cost of 56 paise per unit.”
Escoms had sought a tariff revision, citing the financial burden of IP sets, reduced rainfall, higher thermal energy allocation, power purchase costs and financial losses from the impact of domestic power tariff restructuring announced in the last KERC order.
BESCOM: 56 paise per unit recoverable from consumer
CESC: 15 paise per unit recoverable from consumer
HESCOM: 10 paise per unit to be refunded to consumer
GESCOM: 10 paise per unit to be refunded to consumer
MESCOM: 9 paise per unit to be refunded to consumer
HUKKERI: 155 paise per unit to be refunded to consumer
WHAT IS TRUING-UP CHARGE?
Every year, electric supply companies (Escoms) operate on the basis of projected costs and revenues approved by KERC through the annual tariff order. However, actual performance during the year may differ from these approved projections due to changes in consumer consumption patterns, tariff revisions, input costs and other operational factors. The Annual Performance Review (APR)/Truing-Up petition allows Escoms to reconcile the difference between approved estimates and actual outcomes. KERC reviews the petition and passes orders enabling ESCOMs to recover legitimate deficits from consumers.