Haryana discoms incurring heaviest losses among PSUs

the story overview

The PSUs in Haryana suffered a total loss of Rs 1,239 crore in 2010-11.

The line losses were

understated by 10.54 per cent during 2010-11.

The report states that the discoms are not able

to recover their cost of

operations.
Mohnish Kumar

Chandigarh

The financial health of power distribution companies or discoms of Haryana, Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited(UHBNL) Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited (DHBVNL), deteriorated badly between 2006- 2011 as accumulated losses increased from Rs 1,774 crore to Rs 6,127 crore. The factors such as heavy burden of interest on borrowings, high aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses and increase in employees cost, claims a report issued by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) for the year 2010-11.

The public sector undertakings (PSUs) in Haryana suffered total losses of Rs 1,239 crore in 2010-11 and power discoms incurred the heaviest losses of Rs 1,663 crore. The report states that the discoms were not able to recover their cost of operations and the revenue gap increased from Rs 403 crore to Rs 1,663 crore during 2010-11. “The main reasons for such high energy losses were insufficient transformation capacity, inadequate working capacity of capacitor banks, low power factor, heavy quantum of unmetered consumers and theft of electricity,” said an official.

The operational performance of the discoms is judged on the basis of availability of adequate power for distribution, adequacy and reliability of distribution network, minimising line losses and detection of theft of electricity. Balances remaining outstanding from consumers at the end of the 2010-11 increased in both the disc oms. The amount recoverable from consumers in case of UHBVNL and DHBVNL increased from Rs 1482. 75 crore to Rs 2377.97 crore and Rs 1388. 07 crore to Rs 2250.57 crore respectively during 2006-07 to 2010-11. The importance of reducing losses can be gauged from the fact that one per cent decrease in losses could have added Rs 61. 91 crore to the revenue of UHBVNL. The UHBVNL, losses though decreased from 28.67 per cent in 2006 -2007 to 24 per cent in 2010-2011 were still higher as compared to Haryana Electricity Regulatory Commission(HERC) norm except during 2006- 2007. It is observed that agriculture consumption during 2010—2011 projected at 5028.81 MUs was on higher side as per feeder meters readings the same worked out to 3421.61 million units (MUs). Thus, agriculture consumption was overstated by 1607.18 MUs.

Resultantly, the line losses were understated by 10.54 per cent during 2010-11. Therefore, possibility of showing inflated agriculture consumption during earlier years also could not be ruled out. Thus, the company has been showing distribution losses on lower side.