While hearing the petition filed by UPCl in the matter of the order dated June 20, 2016 on procurement of non-solar RECs in the financial year 2015-16 on Wednesday, the Uttarakhand Electricity Regulatory Commission imposed penalty on five high- ranking UPCl officials.
The commission took strong exception to the perceived inaction on the part of the UPCl officials regarding the matter, holding the non-compliance as deliberate and imposed a personal penalty under Section 142 of the Electricity Act, 2003.
Notably, the commission through its order dated June 20, 2016 had directed UPCl to procure REC equivalent 7.5 per cent of the unmet RPO for non-solar of about 700 MUs by July 31, 2016 and report compliance to the commission immediately. However, on non-receipt of compliance by UPCl, the commission had issued show- cause notice to UPCl.
UPCl through its reply dated September 20, 2016 and also during the hearing referred to Government of India letter dated July 22, 2016 and submitted that it had already requested the commission for revision of its RPO to have the deficit reduced. However, taking cognizance of the estimated deficit of 400 MUs projected by UPCl even after revision of the RPO based on Government of India order, the commission has gone for the harsh step. It has also been observed that RE- based generating stations had witnessed delay in commissioning or loss of generation on account of inadequate evacuation system and frequent breakdown of UPCl’s distribution system.
The commission, in the past, had allowed carry forward of the unmet RPO’s to the ensuing years. However, due to the continuing inaction and casual approach of UPCl, the commission held the non-compliance on the part of UPCl as deliberate and imposed a personal penalty under Section 142 of the Electricity Act, 2003 on the following errant officials of UPCl to be deducted from their salary and deposited within 30 days of the date of order as `50,000 on SS Yadav, Managing Director, UPC while `30,000 on MA Khan, Director (Finance); `20,000 on AK Singh, Chief Engineer (Commercial), UPCl; `10,000 each on Sunil Vaid, Superintending Engineer (Commercial), UPCl and Pravesh Kumar, Executive Engineer (Commercial), UPCl.
The aforesaid hearings were attended by Subhash Kumar, Chairman, UERC, KP Singh, Member (Technical), UERC, Neeraj Sati, Secretary, UERC, Prabhat Dimri, Director (Technical), UERC, Deepak Pandey, Director (Finance), UERC, KK Gupta Joint Director (Finance),UERC and Yash Vardhan Dimri, Deputy Director (Technical).