PANAJI
Congress leaders and workers on Friday ambushed the Chief Electrical Engineer Neelakanta Reddy in his office
over what they called high costs of power for domestic consumers.
They handed over a memorandum to him and expressed their displeasure over a number of electricity-related issues that included complaint phone lines at the Electricity Department being constantly engaged.
Led by Curtorim MLA Reginaldo Lourenco and former Panaji Mayor Surendra Furtado, the Congress agitators presented power bills to Reddy and forced him to
admit that the tariffs had increased by 6%.
Reddy, however, explained that the hike in tariffs was long overdue and the department limited it to 6% instead of a 11% increase after a public hearing.
“We cannot bring it down further as it would lead to huge losses,” Reddy told the agitators. However, adamant Congress party workers insisted that due to the huge number of power cuts in the state, because of which many people suffered, there was no need for an increase in the tariffs of electricity.
Lourenco however made a strong case for cutting tariffs saying the costs were too high for common Goan folk to afford. He said, the chief minister had promised that the state would bear the costs of maintenance of power infrastructure in the State.
The party also demanded that the minimum slab of consumption be raised from 200 units to 500 units and justified the demand, because with standards of living rising, charging the common man for consuming more than 200 units of electricity was unfair.
Later speaking to the media, Reddy said since there was no increase in tariffs for the past two years, there was no option for the department. He also informed that 2.5 lakhs new meters had been bought and were being installed, starting with Bicholim.
He said that with the new digital meters, there would automatically be a 5% increase in people’s consumption as opposed to consumption when they had analogue meters. The new tariffs are effective since April 1.
