NEW DELHI: A large number of Congress workers, under the leadership of Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president Anil Kumar, gheraoed the residence of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal at Civil Lines today, to protest against the Power Purchase Agreement Cost (PPAC) rate hike by the power distribution companies, and demanding a CAG (Comptroller and Auditor General) audit of the accounts of the DISCOMS, as they were collecting crores from the people without any accountability, in collusion with the Delhi Government.
Kumar demanded the immediate roll back of the PPAC rate hike, as Delhiites were not in a position to bear with this additional burden imposed on them by the power companies.
Addressing the Congress workers, Ch. Anil Kumar said that before he became the Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal had talked about the loot of public money by the power companies, and demanded CAG audit of the accounts of the DISCOMS, but after he became the Chief Minister, Kejriwal changed his stance, and started playing to the tunes of the power companies.
He said that the Kejriwal Government has deposited over Rs 11,000 crore directly into the accounts of the power companies in the name of power subsidy in the last 8 years, though the money should have been deposited in the accounts of the consumers.
Kumar said that Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had promised to give free/subsidized power to Delhiites, but it was a false promise, as in the past 8 years, the DISCOMS have looted thousands of crores from the people in the guise of various surcharges as the Kejriwal Government looked the other way to facilitate such a loot of public money. He said that the latest PPAC rate hike by the DISCOMS on their own will raise the power bill tariff by 6 per cent from July, which will put heavy burden on the common people.
Kumar said that when Congress was in power, it did not charge pension trust fund from the power consumers, and collected just 2-3 per cent surcharge on PPAC rate, but the Kejrwal Government was allowing the DISCOMS to charge 22.18 per cent in various taxes.
He said that the DISCOMS collected Rs 2677 crore in pension fund from the consumers between 2018 and 2021, and overall the power distribution companies have taken Rs 37277 crore from the people in various taxes. He demanded the immediate roll back of the PPAC rate hike arbitrarily made by the DISCOMS.
Kumar said that Kejriwal indulged in an empty rhetoric of supplying 200 units of free power, though the truth was that Delhiites pay the highest power tariff in the country. He said that it was shocking that the Delhi Government surrendered 500 megawatt out of over 700 megawatt power received from the Dadri-II power plant at cheap rate, to buy power at a considerably higher rate from private companies as Delhi’s electricity demand went up.
He said that the AAP Government’s silence on the unilateral PPAC rate hike by DISCOMS establishes its complicity to fleece the people, who have now ended up paying a very high rate for their electricity consumption, than before.