Power employees charged the state government of initiating the process of privatization of power distribution companies (Discoms) from the back door.
The four Discoms, all wholly owned subsidiaries of UP Power corporation Limited (UPPCL), have also floated tenders for hiring Rs integrated service provider’ (ISP).
The employees alleged that the service provider would take over as much as 90 percent of the work presently done by engineers and employees of Discoms.
The private firm awarded contract will take over the job of giving new power connection, installation of new metre, raising bill and revenue recovery. Presently this job was done by officials and engineers of Discoms.
After the award of the contract to the service provider, engineers of Discoms will be left with overall monitoring of power supply and revenue recovery.
An office bearer of UP Power Consumer Forum said that the government has also floated tender for selection of ISP in Dakshin power distribution corporation which includes Orai, Etawah and Kannauj circles.
He said that the worst fears of power engineers about privatization of Discoms have proved to be true even before the passage of Indian Electricity (amendment) Bill) 2014 by the Parliament.
The officebearer said that as per tender document, the process of award of contract to ISP in seven circles of four Discoms is targeted to be completed by March 28 and a Letter of Intent (LOI) will be given to the ISP by that date. He said that the seven circles under four Discoms have 3.75 crore power consumers of different categories.
He said that the UPPCL has decided to hand over a large part of power distribution to the ISP due to high aggregate technical and commercial losses. He said that power distribution of Agra city was given to a private company on similar grounds during BSP regime in 2008 and presently that company was making huge profit at the cost of urban consumers.