Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Apr 18: Liabilities and power purchase bill of Jammu and Kashmir have reached alarming level as compared to revenue realization. While liabilities and power purchase bill were going up every year, there hasn’t been significant revenue realization. Though revenue was also increasing, the gap between power purchase and revenue was widening.
Official sources told the Excelsior that the latest liabilities on account of electricity, which mostly comprised the power purchase bill, stood at Rs 5154 crores up to just ended financial year of 2014-15. The liabilities included unpaid power purchase bill.
Adding to the woes of the State Government was poor revenue realization from the consumers. The Power Development Department (PDD) had fixed Rs 3508.62 crores worth revenue target for the last financial year of 2014-15 but the realization was only Rs 1750 crores, which was less than 50 per cent.
Asserting that revenue targets were being fixed on higher side to encourage the PDD officials towards better realization, sources said that since 1996-97, the revenue targets have never been achieved.
During previous financial year of 2013-14, the Government had fixed revenue target of Rs 3344.60 crores but the PDD had realized revenue of only Rs 1714.25 crores.
In the past three years, the revenue realization has almost been the same. In 2012-13, the PDD had realized Rs 1693.51 crores worth revenue, which went up to Rs 1714.25 crores in 2013-14 and Rs 1750 crores in 2014-15. The Government had suddenly jumped revenue realization target from Rs 2011.47 crores in 2012-13 to Rs 3344.60 crores in 2013-14.
According to sources, the total power liabilities of Jammu and Kashmir presently stood at Rs 5154 crores after adjustments. The liabilities had at one time gone up to Rs 6266.13 crores but they came down after adjustment of some plan grants towards the Power Development Corporation (PDC).
Sources said the power purchase bill of the State Government has also touched Rs 5200 crores approximately during last financial year in view of ever increasing demand of electricity. Even as the PDD was resorting to both scheduled and unscheduled power cuts in the peak hours especially during summer in Jammu and winter in Kashmir, it has to purchase the power from Central Public Sector Undertakings (CPSUs) and PDC to meet the growing demand.
During 2013-14 and 2012-13, Jammu and Kashmir Government had purchased power worth Rs 4471.96 crores and Rs 4103.08 crores respectively, which indicated that power purchase bill of the State was ever increasing in view of increasing demand of power in the State.
According to sources, the Government has now asked the Power Development Department to take all measures to reduce massive gap between power purchase bill and revenue generation in view of heavy losses being suffered by the State on account of the gap.
However, sources said, the Government too didn’t want to subject the people to additional power cuts or take hard measures for revenue realization as it could lead to unrest among the people especially when summer is at its peak in Jammu and winter in the Kashmir.
“The Government wanted to devise its strategy in such a way that neither the people had to suffer for want of power nor the Department had to face huge gap between power purchase and revenue realization. Efforts were on to work out some methods in this regard,” they added.
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