The State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC) denied the allegation that it had waited for the Assesmbly session to end to announce the new electricity tariff.
The Commission, headed by K J Mathew, said in a statement that the announcement was delayed due to a court case. The HT/EHT Industrial Electricity Consumers Association had moved the Kerala High Court against the tariff revision.
After this, the Commission had halted the revision proceedings. It was taken up after the court gave the go-ahead for the revision and the tariff was announced on Thursday.
The Commission’s clarification follows an allegation by Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan that the announcement was deliberately delayed until after the Assembly session. The Commission had held hearings in Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi and Kozhikode ahead of the revision and also discussed the issue in the state advisory committee of the Commission.
Protests Continue: Protests continued to spill out into the streets on Friday against the revision of electricity tariff. The NCP burnt Electricity Minister Aryadan Mohammed in effigy demanding immediate roll-back of the power tariff hike.
The AIYF, which had staged protests across the state, said here that it intended to intensify the agitation in the coming days. AIYF state committee also condemned the police action against AIYF activists who protested against the hike in Palakkad on Friday. In Alappuzha also, police moved in to remove AIYF activists who barged into a KSEB facility. “In Ernakulam, police arrested AIYF men who waved black flags at Finance Minister K M Mani,” the AIYF said in a statement.