By Advocate Sachin Godambe
Mahavitaran (MSEDCL) has proposed another big hike of around 40% for all types of customers, Residential & Commercial –
Electric Shock! Mahavitaran wants hike of 40 percent in power charges
This is absolutely not required & I oppose them as a citizen for following reasons —
(1) MSEDCL’s electricity charges per slab are already high. Many others states give electricity at lower rates like Delhi.
(2) MSEDCL’s current total bill is having around 70 to 80% taxes under 4 different heading –
– Fixed Charges of Rs. 65 Per month
– FAC (Fuel Adjustment Cost)
– Carrying Charges (Rs. 1.18 per unit)
– Electricity Duty (16%)
This is nothing but LOOT of public in broad daylight. Why not remove all these charges & bring Electricity under GST slab of 5 or 12 % only which will reduce monthly bill to great extent ?
Example — For average residential consumer if his total energy charges is Rs. 435 for usage of 115 Units his actual bill by adding all above 4 charges comes to Rs. 757 which is almost less than double of actual energy usage of Rs. 435.
(3) MSEDCL has crore of Rs. deposit with them taken from all customers whose interest needs to be paid back regularly & transparently
(4) MSEDCL or MERC or State Govt. should do yearly Audit of all of their expenses & total per unit production cost etc. to weed out massive corruption in this sector.
(5) MSEDCL must accept online complaints for all types of customer issues & email id for this should be published on bill itself so that people don’t have to rush to their offices from taking multiple half day off from their office work. All such a complaints should be resolved within 3 working days failing which fine should be levied on concerned officers. In such a digital age, MSEDCL is the only Govt. dept. who did not accept online complaint for all issues & act on them swiftly.
(6) MSEDCL or MERC or State Govt. should goahead with more renewable energy sources to generate electricity like from sea water, dams, solar, wind etc. Huge subsidy should be given to customers generating & using Solar power for their own use. Strict action should be taken against officers coming in the way of this.
(7) Electricity theft going on in all types of religious activities. There should be strict action against such a theft. At one side we are paying 70-80 % taxes on actual energy usage & at other side these religious people uses light freely without any action taken against them
(8) Form an expert panel from this field to do more reforms & bring transparency, accountability in this sector & weed out massive corruption going on from years.
(9) MSEDCL should go green & generate exactly same bill like printed one which can be downloaded & printed by needy people and use it as same copy like current printed bill. This will reduce expenditure of Rs. 6-7 per bill incurred as of now for vendor distributing these bills.
