Chandigarh, July 18
In a major turnaround, the two power distribution companies (Discoms) – Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN) and Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (UHBVN) have earned profits of Rs 412 crore in 2017-18 after running in losses for nearly 14 years.
Additionally, Haryana Power Generation Corporation Limited (HPGCL) and Haryana Vidyut Prasaran Nigam (HVPN) have also earned profits of Rs 58 and Rs 149 crore respectively.
The HPGCL is responsible for generation of power, the HVPN for its transmission while both DHBVN and UHBVN have a mandate of distributing power to the consumers in their respective areas.
Together, the four public sector undertakings have earned profit of Rs 619 crore – the share of profits earned by DHBVN and UHBVN being Rs 134 crore and Rs 278 crore respectively.
Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar had recently announced that the government was contemplating reducing power tariff since the discoms have started earning profits after long time.
“This is all because of increase in efficiency brought about in the functioning of PSUs responsible for generation, transmission and distribution of electricity through better management. The results in the improved efficiency are evident from the marked decline in aggregated technical and commercial (AT&C) losses, also called commercial losses, of the discoms in the past four years,” said PK Das, Additional Chief Secretary, Power Department, Haryana.
Das said that the AT&C losses which were 29.58 per cent in 2014-15, rose slightly to 29.97 per cent in 2015-16, came down to 25.57 per cent in 2016-17 and have now come further down to 20.20 per cent in 2017-18.
Sources said that the last time power utilities earned significant profit was in 2003-04 after which these have been running in losses, though last year the DHBVN earned a small profit of Rs 12 crore.
“The commercial losses came down by curbing pilferage of power, improving recoveries of bills and bringing down line losses by replacing old lines and transformers with new and better performing one,” he added.
However, sources said that much of the credit for turnaround also goes to Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (UDAY) launched by the Central Government in 2015 under which the state government took over loan of Rs 25,950 crore out of total loan burden of Rs 35,000 crore on the discoms.
Finance Minister Captain Abhimanyu said that UDAY proved a financial turnaround and revival package for the power distributing companies as by taking over their loans worth Rs 25,950, the government saved them from annual interest liability of nearly Rs 2,600 crore.