Power tariff hike in city to come into effect tomorrow

The 26 per cent hike in power tariff for domestic consumers in the city will come into effect from tomorrow.

The new rates were announced by the Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission on Wednesday. The domestic consumers will be the hardest hit as tariff for the segment has been hiked the most compared to commercial and industrial categories. This is the fourth hike in tariff in the last 10 months. The regulator in August last year had hiked the tariff by 22 per cent for all categories of consumers.

The tariff was hiked by five per cent in February and by upto two per cent in May to adjust the power purchase cost of the distribution companies. The hike in areas served by NDPL will be around 27.88 per cent while the increase in areas served by BSES Rajdhani Power Ltd and BSES Yamuna Power Ltd will be 25.47 per cent and 25.29 per cent respectively.

Justifying the hike, the DERC had said the combined deficits of three discoms have been estimated at around Rs 6,000 crore and there was no alternative but to hike the tariff. As per the new rates, a domestic consumer will be charged Rs 3.70 per unit for the first 200 units of power instead of the current Rs 3. Consumers having a monthly usages of upto 400 units will have to pay Rs 4.80 per unit of power. For consumption above 400 units, Rs 6.40 per unit will be charged instead of current Rs 5.70, Sudhakar said.

The increase may also lead to hike in metro fares and water charges as DERC announced separate rates for power being supplied to these two entities.