PM Modi reviews progress of Uday scheme

Under Uday, state governments are required to take over 75 per cent of the short-term liabilities of their respective discoms (as in September-end 2015), 50 per cent in the first year (FY16) and the balance in FY17.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday reviewed the progress of the Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (Uday). The meeting was attended by power minister Piyush Goyal, senior officials from the PMO, Niti Aayog and other ministries. Under Uday, state governments are required to take over 75 per cent of the short-term liabilities of their respective discoms (as in September-end 2015), 50 per cent in the first year (FY16) and the balance in FY17. The accumulated losses of discoms stood at a staggering Rs 3.8 lakh crore at the launch of Uday. Their outstanding debt then stood at Rs 4.3 lakh crore.

State governments of 16 states have taken over around Rs 2.08 lakh crore debt of their electricity distribution companies (Discoms) as per the terms of Uday. This helped in lowering interest rates to 7 per cent-8.5 per cent from around 11-12 per cent, resulting in Discoms saving Rs11,989 crore till December 2016.

The performances of several state Discoms have seen an improvement since they signed up for the Uday. The narrowing of the gap between the Discoms’ average cost of supply (ACS) and average revenue realised (ARR) by Rs 0.07/unit in FY17. The average aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses for all Uday states has come down by about four percentage points to 20.2 per cent as well.

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However, some targets in the operational front remain elusive. While more than 21 lakh distribution transformers had been metered till March, 2017, the number is not even 50 per cent of the target which needs to be met by December, 2017. Uday also envisaged the installation of smart meters for consumers using more than 200 units of electricity every month by December, 2019.

A presentation was also made to the PM on coal mine and mineral block auctions. Modi called for greater coordination between all mineral-related departments during the survey and mapping of geological potential regions.

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