Power Tariff Hike: Jagan’s protests nothing but hypocrisy says Minister

Vijayawada: Energy minister Gottipati Ravi Kumar said former chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy has reached another milestone by taking up protests against the electricity charges he had previ-ously proposed to increase. The minister accused the former CM of burdening the people with his ill-advised decisions during his tenure.

Ravi Kumar said in a statement on Thursday that when the TDP handed over power in 2019, Andhra Pradesh was a power surplus state. However, Jagan’s government turned it into a pow-er deficit state within five years due to poor decisions and corruption. He claimed that Jagan Mohan Reddy cancelled power purchase agreements, threatened solar and wind energy inves-tors, and drove them out of the state, causing the loss of 10,000 MW of renewable energy. The minister also accused Jagan of ruining APGenco named for power generation. He alleged that in the name of addressing a power deficit, Jagan’s government purchased electricity at inflated prices—between Rs 8 and Rs 14 per unit, while it was available at Rs 5 per unit. These overpriced purchases, he said, were made to benefit close associates and earn commissions.

Minister Ravi Kumar highlighted that true-up charges approved by the Andhra Pradesh Elec-tricity Regulatory Commission (APERC) during Jagan’s tenure have now become a heavy bur-den on the people. These charges amounted to Rs 3,082 crore for 2021-22, Rs 6,073 crore for 2022-23 and Rs 9,412 crore for 2023-24.

Ravi Kumar revealed that APERC was required to issue the final order on the true-up charges within 90 days of filing. In fact, discoms had filed the Q4 charges for 2022-23 in May 2023, meaning the commission should have issued the orders by August.

For 2023-24, discoms filed the charges in May 2024. However, the implementation of these charges was postponed to avoid backlash before the elections. Eventually, the charges were approved, increasing the financial burden on consumers.

The energy minister said Jagan’s protests against electricity tariff hikes is nothing but hypocrit-ical. “Jagan himself created this crisis with his policies, and now he is staging dharnas to mis-lead the people,” he said.

He assured the people that the current government is taking steps to fix the damage caused by the previous administration and to ensure transparency and accountability in the power sec-tor.