Left demands rollback of power tariff

he Communist Party of India (Marxist) has demanded that the State government roll back the hike in power tariff announced for a section of consumers with immediate effect.

CPI(M) State secretary B.V. Raghavulu along with a delegation of Left parties' leaders called on Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy on Saturday and urged him to spare the middle and lower classes from the burden of the tariff hike. The latest tariff hike would impose an additional burden of Rs.641 crore on these sections.

The hike was in addition to the huge amounts being collected in the name of fuel surcharge adjustments under which the utilities so far collected Rs.1,649 crore in 2008-09 and Rs.1,439 crore in 2009-10 and Rs.1,286 crore for the first nine months of the financial year 2010-11. Mr. Raghavulu lamented that the government was allowing private power developers to sell the power generated here at higher rates to other States, while the utilities were spending exorbitant amounts to purchase power from outside.

(Courtesy : The Hindu)