New Delhi: The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the plea of the Reliance Group companies BSES against the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) notice threatening to cut off power supply for not clearing outstanding dues. The apex court will hear the plea on Friday.
Raising a fear of an eight to 10 hour power cuts in February in East Delhi and Central Delhi, the NTPC had rejected Delhi government’s plea to continue power supply to BSES Yamuna Power Limited. The NTPC had informed the power discom that a power supply cut is imminent if payments are not made in time. Delhi’s power requirement is about 6000 MW out of which 3175 MW is supplied by NTPC.
Reliance Infra-backed power distribution company BSES Yamuna Power Ltd has informed Delhi government that the company was facing serious fund crunch to buy electricity. In a letter to Delhi’s Power Secretary Puneet Goel, BYPL had sought immediate financial assistance from the government to deal with the “difficult” situation as it was not being able to make payments to various state-run power generators including NTPC and NHPC.
The BSES had said that the company is hopeful of avoiding a major power cut in Delhi and has requested the Delhi government to step in to defuse the crisis. BSES sources say bank holding back funds is leading to a payment problem. BYPL has sought immediate intervention of Delhi Government in helping it overcome the situation and urged it to take up the issue urgently with NTPC, NHPC, Ministry of Power and Ministry of Finance.
The BSES Yamuna Power Ltd and BSES Rajdhani Power Ltd, which supply power in 70 per cent areas in Delhi, owe around Rs 4,000 crore to Delhi Government-run power generation and transmission companies. Both BRPL and BYPL have been maintaining that they are going through difficult financial condition.
They have been demanding significant hike in tariff, citing rise in power purchase cost. According to DERC figures, the private discoms operating in the city have a revenue gap of whopping Rs 19,500 crore.
Bureau Report
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