The federal energy minister has announced the abolition of the additional charges formula applied when electricity consumption exceeds 201 units.
Speaking during a Senate session, Awais Leghari said the government was going to abolish the formula of additional charges for six months when electricity consumption exceeds 201 units. He said that poor people were benefiting less from this facility, while the rich were benefiting more. The government was working rapidly, and a new policy would be introduced very soon.
The energy minister said that the circular debt in the energy sector had decreased to Rs1,670 billion. The target was to eliminate circular debt within the next four years, and the debt servicing surcharge on circular debt would also be abolished. At the time the government took office, the Ministry of Energy was receiving budgetary support of Rs1,180 billion, which had decreased to Rs700 billion in the current year.
He further said that losses of distribution companies (DISCOs) had been reduced every year, but consumers had not yet received the benefits of this reduction.
On this, Senator Abid Sher Ali said that electricity tariffs were linked to millions of people across Pakistan. Electricity bills for protected consumers were also beyond the public’s financial means. He said that when electricity consumption exceeded 200 units by even a single unit, the bill suddenly doubled. He asked whether the burden of electricity theft by DISCOs was also being placed on poor people.
In response, Awais Leghari said that determining electricity tariff slabs was necessary to resolve this issue in the future. He said that the number of consumers using up to 200 units of electricity had reached 20 million. Most consumers using up to 200 units relied on solar energy. He added that the government was working on a system to provide relief to consumers based on poverty rather than the number of electricity units consumed.
