The Hindu Business Line : South Mumbai shop owners pay highest power tariffs

THE highest retail power tariff in the country is paid by shop-owners in the South Mumbai area, serviced by Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport Undertaking (BEST), who have to shell out a whopping Rs 10.09 per unit for a commercial connection.

At the other end of the spectrum, farmers in Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh pay just 19 paise and 30 paise per unit respectively — excluding, of course, the farmers of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu who get power free.

Closely trailing BEST's commercial customers are shopkeepers in Kerala, who are faced with unenviable power tariffs of Rs 9.69 per unit for a high-end commercial connection, according to information available with the Ministry of Power.

Industrial consumers, who along with the commercial users,have been the traditional whipping boys for the most State electricity boards (SEBs), also have to pay massive power charges, despite over three years of tariff rationalisation by various State Electricity Regulatory Commissions (SERCs).

For instance, industrial consumers in the BEST area in Mumbai (Reliance Energy and the Maharashtra SEB supply power to the other two zones in Mumbai) pay the highest tariff at Rs 8.27 per unit for the medium industry segment, closely followed by industrial consumers in Kerala, who have to pay Rs 7.43 per unit.

On the other hand, Maharashtra (excluding Mumbai city) pampers its industrial consumers by charging the lowest tariff at Rs 2.43 per unit for both the medium and small industry. In fact, the industrial tariff charged by the MSEB is much lower than the tariff paid by the State's domestic consumers at Rs 3.45 per unit for the lowest bracket. This is in contrast to the experience in nearly all the other States, where industry cross-subsidises domestic and agricultural consumers.

Among domestic users, the rural consumers in Jharkhand are charged only 36 paise per unit, the lowest domestic tariff in the country. Domestic consumers in Bihar's rural areas pay only 63 paise per unit, while domestic consumers in Mumbai's BEST area are clearly cross subsidised by their high paying commercial and industrial counterparts and have to pay just 99 paise per unit of electricity consumed.

Gujarat's domestic consumers, on the other hand, pay the highest domestic tariff at Rs 5.88 per unit, followed by their counterparts in Kerala who have to pay Rs 5.18 per unit, due to the high-priced power purchased by the State from the National Thermal Power Corporation's Kayamkulam station.

According to Power Ministry officials, the SERCs in most States have already begun rationalising the lopsided retail power tariffs by disallowing huge tariff hikes to the industrial and commercial consumers year after year.

It is expected that over a period, industry would stop bearing the brunt of the annual tariff revisions and that the annual revenue requirements projected by the SEBs are equitably distributed across all categories.

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