NEW DELHI: The Delhi government on Wednesday approved an amended policy on compensation to consumers for unscheduled power cuts. However industry experts have raised red flags on “practical difficulties” in implementing the scheme. Compensation to consumers was one of the promises that Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had made in the run up to the elections in the national capital.
Under the Electricity Act 2003, according to regulations, power companies are liable to compensate their consumers for power supply failures as well as other defaults in performance.The Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission (DERC), which is the final authority in matters related to the issue, has been in constant touch with several power distribution companies (DISCOMS) for the penalties. According to the statement by the Ministry of Power, in case of unscheduled power cuts lasting more than an hour, a consumer will be paid compensation of `50 per hour for the first two hours and `100 per hour thereafter. If interruption reoccurs, the compensation will be paid from the initial default.
The policy further states that In case of unscheduled power cuts, the compensation shall be payable automatically by the Discom to all the affected consumers, without requiring a claim. The companies will submit a report also to the DERC of all compensations given out by them.
“There are a few issues on the ground which needs to be looked at before going ahead with the policy. Determination of the reason for the outages — whether it is on account of distribution, transmission or generation failure or consumer’s own installation failure has to be determined. In Delhi, around 50 lakh meters would need to be replaced... Discoms face challenges to augment their infrastructure in congested and unauthorized colonies,” said an expert.