It has been reported in some newspapers that Ministry of Power has sent the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 to the Law Ministry for vetting. It is also reported that the Ministry of Power intends to introduce and pass the Bill in the ongoing budget session of Parliament.
2. The All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) wants to draw your kind attention towards the fact that the Ministry of Power has not yet put the Bill draft on its website and the whole approach of MoP is not at all transparent in this respect. The Ministry of Power issued a letter to the Principal Secretary (Energy) of all States / UT's & CMD’s of Power Corporations of all States / UT's on 05th February 2021 circulating draft Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 and invited comments on draft Bill of all States /UT's within two weeks.
3. But before expiry date (ie 19 Feb 2021) to submit comments on EA Bill 2021 MoP through a letter dt 10th February 2021 issued notice for video conferencing of Principal Secretary (Energy) of all States / UT's & CMD of Power Corporations of all States / UT's which was held on 17th February 2021. As per reports representatives of many States / UT's vehemently opposed several clauses of draft Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 in VC held on 17th February. Again a meeting of Regulators was held on 02nd March 2021 which was hurriedly called with 3 days notice. In this meeting also Regulators of several States opposed some clauses of EA Bill 2021. In both these meetings it was assured by the Minister of Power that objections raised by States / UT's shall be taken into account and accordingly amended draft EA Bill 2021 will be circulated.
4. But to utter surprise news coming in the media is disturbing that MoP has circulated the EA Bill 2021 for vetting to Law & Justice Ministry and other inter related Ministries for finalisation of draft for approval of Union Cabinet.
5. Because of these non transparent developments RTI applications were sent to various States/UTs regarding the MOP OM of 05 Feb vide which the Bill was originally circulated to States. Reply has been received from J&K (Letter of 09 March) that MoP OM of 05 Feb has not been received. Thus Mop has processed the comments on Bill while J&K kas been ignored.
J&K reply is as below......
"Kindly refer to your application No ps/rti/1402b dt 14 - 02 - 2021 regarding the subject cited above, it is intimated that this office has not received OM of 05 Feb from the Ministry of Power, Government of India."
6. You would kindly agree, Sir, that by ignoring one State/UT the entire exercise of amendment of Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 becomes invalid and this one event alone is sufficient to scrap the entire revision process.
7. It is also noteworthy to mention that the Ministry of Power has not only excluded one State / UT but through the entire secret process it has ignored the most important consumers' view point and that of power employees & engineers whose views are must before going through any amendment in Electricity Act 2003 which will have far reaching consequences.
8. AIPEF requests you to kindly use your good offices and issue a directive to MoP to withdraw draft Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021 sent to the Ministry of Law & Justice and other inter Ministerial offices. The procedure adopted by the Ministry of Power is totally non transparent, discriminatory, arbitrary and un decromatic. Therefore AIPEF requests you to scrap /withdraw the draft Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2021.
Thank You with regards.
Sincerely Yours