The Madras High Court is slated to hear on Monday a public interest litigation petition which describes as “arbitrary and unjust” a methodology adopted by the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (Tangedco) to collect power consumption charges for the period during which field workers could not record meter readings due to the COVID-19 lockdown.
Justices R. Subbiah and Krishnan Ramasamy would take up the case, filed by M.L. Ravi of Desiya Makkal Sakthi Katchi. According to the litigant, power consumption charges were collected on a bi-monthly basis in the State. The charges were calculated based on different slabs for those who consume below 100 units, 101 to 200 units, 201 to 500 units, and above 500 units. While the State government provided full subsidy for the first 100 units to all consumers, every unit consumed beyond that was charged at different rates for those falling under different slabs.
The field staff of Tangedco had failed to note down electricity meter readings of many power consumers due to the lockdown. Hence, it was ordered that such consumers could pay the same charges that they had paid in the previous billing cycle and get the amount adjusted when the readings get recorded in May or June.
Stating that there was no problem as far as the first portion of Tangedco’s decision was concerned, the litigant noted that the problem was with its directive to divide the number of units that get recorded in May and June ‘equally’ into two for the last two billing cycles. Such equal division of units for two billing cycles would force customers to shell out more money, he claimed.
Own example
Providing an example, Mr. Ravi said he had consumed 480 units and paid ₹1,070 (inclusive of the fixed charge of ₹30) for the same before the lockdown. That bill amount was calculated by providing a full subsidy for the first 100 units and charging ₹2 per unit for 101 to 200 units. The units from 201 to 480 were charged at the rate of ₹3 per unit, since he fell under the ‘below 500 units’ slab.
The meter readings in his house were not recorded during the lockdown, and he paid ₹1,070 for the next billing cycle too. However, when the readings were recorded subsequently, it was found that he had consumed 1,240 units since the last time they were recorded. Hence, Tangedco divided them into two and considered him to have consumed 620 units each during the last two billing cycles.
Such equal division meant that he had crossed the ‘above 500 units’ slab during both the billing cycles. So, he was charged ₹2,572 per billing cycle by providing full subsidy for the first 100 units and charging ₹3.5 per unit for 101 to 200 units. Units between 201 to 500 were charged at ₹4.60 per unit and a whopping ₹6.60 per unit was charged for 501 to 620 units.
After finding that he had to pay ₹5,144 for the two billing cycles, Tangedco deducted the ₹1,070 he had already paid and asked him to pay the rest. Opposing the division of units equally between two billing cycles, the petitioner said Tangedco should have ideally charged him only for 480 units during the first billing cycle (when readings were not recorded) and 760 units in the next. If such division had been done, the petitioner would have come under the ‘below 500 units’ slab at least for one billing cycle and would not have had to make an additional payment of ₹578, which amounted to 12.66% of the total bill amount, he said.
It was also brought to the notice of the court that thousands of consumers using 100 to 500 units every billing cycle had to shell out more money. On the other hand, the methodology did not harm in any way the affluent, who normally consume over 500 units every billing cycle, because there wouldn’t be any change in their bill amounts, he noted.
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June 14, 2020 at 01:05AM
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Case filed against manner of calculation of power consumption charges during lockdown - The Hindu
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