The Uttarakhand Congress has demanded that the State government should immediately take back its decision to increase power tariffs in the State. In a letter directed to the chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, the Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Karan Mahara has said that the State government is trying to foist a hefty increase of 27 per cent in the power tariffs which is not justified. He said that the proposed hike in power price will prove to be a double whammy for the general public already reeling under the effect of price rise. Mahara said that the poor will bear the maximum brunt of the power hike. The PCC president pointed out that despite being a power producing State, the power tariff in Uttarakhand is more than many States which have almost no power production. The government is taking a new loan from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in the name of strengthening the network and purchasing additional power and the burden is being passed on to the general public.

 The PCC president claimed that between the years 2017 to 2022, the power tariffs have been increased by about 39 per cent. The prices of cooking gas, petroleum products and food products have also increased exponentially.

Mahara said that on the one hand the general public is being burdened with the load of power tariff hike and on the other hand, crores of rupees were paid to two Gujarat based companies without producing a single unit of power. He warned that the Congress party will hit the roads if the State government does not roll back the proposed power hike.