Power cuts in Delhi are minor and localised, say discoms

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have been locked in a war of words over the issue, with the matter being raised in the Delhi Assembly on Tuesday. Power Minister Ashish Sood said in the House that maintenance of the power grid was behind some outages.

In its statement on Wednesday, BSES said, “Power supply across our network is normal and continues to be reliable. Minor, localised disruptions — an inherent aspect of power distribution — may occasionally occur, but these are swiftly addressed. At times, power outages also take place on account of maintenance, which is essential to the smooth functioning of the network.”

Tata Power-DDL, meanwhile, attributed the power cuts to a delayed maintenance schedule.

The discom, which supplies power to North Delhi, said it typically conducts maintenance and network upgradation work between October and March. “But this year, due to GRAP restrictions in November and December 2024, our scheduled maintenance/network upgradation outage plan was amplified in March… Each year, Tata Power-DDL enhances and expands its network to effectively address the continuously rising demand driven by population growth and the increased electricity consumption resulting from lifestyle changes, such as the use of appliances like air conditioners,” it said.

Giving details of “planned cuts”, the discom said, “(in) Delhi University, no power cuts were seen in the last one week; in Kirari, there were seven planned shutdowns of average 1 hour for system improvement schemes… Rohini Sector 22 saw one planned shutdown of six hours… to augment the distribution transformer. Burari saw nine planned shutdowns over a week, each averaging three hours…”  Residents, however, continued to post complaints on social media, alleging they were not informed.

The discoms earlier said they were anticipating a spike in peak power demand this summer.