Government, industry meet on power tariff today

Coimbatore: Owners of industrial units across the state will take a call on whether to stage a token protest or launch an indefinite strike against the power tariff hike based on the outcome of a meeting on Monday, which will see participation of electricity minister V Senthil Balaji and senior government officials.
Tamil Nadu Small and Tiny Industries Association president K Mariappan, who will attend the meeting, told TOI that the exorbitant fixed charges will severely affect micro, small & medium enterprises.
“Representations of industrial associations will be compiled during the meeting scheduled at the secretariat in Chennai on Monday. Despite continuous representations, the proposed power tariff was implemented in the second week of the month after making some changes in the fixed charges. However, the fixed charges are still high and put MSMEs in a huge debt. We have come out with a proposal on how to effectively calculate the power tariff, without affecting industrial units,” he said.
Industrial units had earlier planned to stage a statewide protest on September 20, but the decision was postponed because of an invite from the state government for talks. “If the outcome of the meeting is not in our favour, we will go ahead with our plan to protest to press our demands,” Mariappan added.