On the back of the State government’s announcement about the implementation of the Gruha Jyothi scheme from July comes a shock for consumers of Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (Bescom); the tariff for June will be up by ₹2.89 per unit, owing to fuel and power purchase cost adjustment (FPPCA), as well as arrears from April.
While the FPPCA for this January, which was supposed to reflect in March, could not be implemented owing to billing issues and scarcity of time for implementation, the FPPCA of ₹1.49 per unit will be levied in June.
A tariff order, which was passed on May 12, stated that the approved 70 paise per unit hike had to be claimed in June. Along with this, arrears of 70 paise for April will also be added to the bill for June. Hence, there will be a tariff increase of ₹2.89 per unit this month.
“Due to many technical reasons, the FPPCA could not be recovered in March and the rules had provided the power to do the same. It cannot be deferred anymore now as the rules do not allow. Hence it will be collected,” said Ravikumar P., chairman, Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC).
Subsequently, the KERC has ordered the electricity supply companies (Escoms) to recover the FPPCA for the third quarter of the financial year 2022-23 from July to December, 2023, as opposed to the billing quarter of April to June, 2023, when it was supposed to be collected, upon the request of Escoms.
Accordingly, Bescom will recover 51 paise per unit between July and September and 50 paise per unit between October and December.
With the government announcing that the power bills of those who consume less than 200 units would be taken care of from its side, questions were raised about how the FPPCA would be recovered.
Talking about the same, Mr. Ravikumar said: “As the government has announced that it will cover their bills, then it is likely that all payments under the bill would be made by its side. However, we cannot say anything for sure until the guidelines are issued”.
