Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Friday submitted a memorandum to Punjab Governor VP Singh Badnore on the issue of “all-time high power tariff” in the State.
As a part of the party’s ongoing ‘Bijli Andolan’, a delegation of AAP leaders, led by the Leader of Opposition in Vidhan Sabha Harpal Singh Cheema and Sunam MLA Aman Arora, sought Governor’s intervention to check the increasing power tariff besides scrapping the power purchase agreements (PPAs) signed between the previous Badal government and the private power plants enabling the people to heave a sigh of relief.
AAP leaders maintained that the unprecedented hike in electricity tariff touching a new high had come as a shocker for the people of the State.
Arora, who is also coordinator of the ongoing ‘Bijli andolan’, said that electricity was costlier in Punjab when compared to what consumers in certain other states of the country were paying.
He said that Capt Amarinder Singh Government should initiate steps to curb the recurring rise in the power tariff, thereby enabling the people to come out of the scare looming large on them by making electricity within the common man’s reach.
Citing the Delhi model, Arora said that the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi Government said that the dispensation had taken hard steps to tame the mighty power mafia during its four-year regime, providing cheaper electricity to consumer there even as it procures electricity from private power plants.
Arora said that if the Delhi Government could provide cheaper electricity in the national capital, why was the Captain Government running away from replicating the model in the state by way of scrapping the PPAs signed between the then Badal government and three private power players.
He said that affordable electricity could be made available to the people provided the State Government mulled over cancellation of the anti-state power purchase agreements (PPAs) signed between the previous Badal Government and the private thermal plants in Punjab, leading to an unprecedented rise in the power tariff.
Arora added that the agreements were set to cost the government Rs 2,800 crores per year, ending up with a total loss of Rs 70,000 crores in the coming 25 years.
Slamming both Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh and Power Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu, for being insensitive to the cause of the people, Arora said that both were busy flexing their muscles at the cost of the people of the State which had left them suffer in silence.
Arora said that the Governor had assured the delegation of taking up the issue with the State Government for redressal.