The dispute over the power dues payable by Telangana power distribution companies to the AP Power Generation Corporation appears unlikely to end any time soon as the Ministry of Home Affairs has referred the matter to the Ministry of Law for its opinions on the applicability of provisions of the AP Reorganisation Act.
The issue was discussed during the virtual meeting of the representatives of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh with the MHA joint secretary Ashish Kumar and representatives of different Union Ministries conducted recently to sort out bilateral issues between the two Telugu States. The Telangana Government has affirmed that it was willing to settle the issue from the beginning and some progress was made in this direction.
But the AP power utilities approached the NCLT and subsequently, filed a writ petition in the High Court of Telangana making the issue sub-judice. “Telangana has no dispute regarding the amount of dues. However, the amount of dues receivable by the State should be taken into account while settling the dues,” the Telangana Government told the Union Government.
The Telangana Government asserted that it was open for settlement if the AP Government was wiling to settle it out of the court. It, however, reiterated that partial settlement of the issue was not acceptable and it would go by total settlement. The AP Government on its part contended that power was supplied as per the directions of the Central Government till June 2017 and the TS Discoms made part payment to APGenco.
Still an amount of ₹3,442 crore as principal and ₹3,014 crore as late payment surcharge was outstanding on Dec 31, 2021 according to the provisions in the power purchase agreement. The issue had to be delinked with other demerger issues of the power utilities and the petition filed (by the AP Govt) in the High Court of Telangana would not come in the way of settlement of these dues keeping in view the PPA and the Centre’s directions. There were also no orders from the High Court prohibiting any directions in this regard by the Centre.
The Power Ministry officials informed the meeting that the order had been referred to Ministry of Law seeking clarity on whether order under Section 92 of the Reorganisation Act could be given for the payment and whether this amount could be deducted from the account of Telangana and credited to the account of the neighbouring State.
Mr. Ashish Kumar requested the Telangana Government that other issues raised by it emanated from the Schedule XII (Part (C)-Power, Para-8) of the AP Reorganisation Act and it should be treated as separate matter. It would be examined separately by the MHA otherwise it would be difficult for the Ministry to address and resolve the issue. He had accordingly suggested that after getting the views of the Ministry of Law, the Union Power Ministry could communicate to both the States and MHA for their comments.
Further action would be taken on the issue based on the comments of the two States and opinion of the Ministry of Power.
