To improve its financial condition, the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) on Tuesday proposed that the civic body start charging the power discom in its area for the use of municipal land.
Nirmal Jain, councillor from Shahdara, proposed that the power discom BSES Yamuna Power Limited (BYPL), which is responsible for supplying power to east Delhi, has been “illegally” using the corporation’s land for setting up transformers, but has not paid a single penny for it.
“When power privatisation happened in 2007, the land, which is being used by discoms for setting up their poles and transformers, was leased to them at just ₹1,” Mr. Jain said. He added that even now these power companies are setting up transformers in parks, walkways and roads and have been earning crores of profit out of these operations. “However, the corporation is not getting a single penny”.
‘Hefty income’
The councillor said that this land, if utilised or rented for some other purpose, would’ve have brought a hefty income.
“A survey must be conducted to earmark all the spots where the transformers have been set up and also analyse proposals of all the ones that are to be set up. An initial report can be prepared to see how much revenue can be generated through the land that they have used,” said Mr. Jain.
The proposal also said that the civic body could consider charging rent from the discom for the transformers, which were set up before 2007.
A similar proposal was floated in the north Delhi corporation in 2014. The civic body had set up a special panel to come up with policy on leasing land to discom TPDDL. Civic body officials said that the discom was using municipal land without paying rent, leading to huge revenue losses.