Forget tariff hike, fix outages first: Noida residents to UP govt

Reeling under severe power outages, residents and industrialists of the satellite city are opposing the proposal of Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Limited (UPPCL) for a 26 per cent hike in tariffs.

Disruption in supplies has spiked during the peak summer season with outages continuing for up to four five hours and at times for a day or two in separate sectors of Noida and Greater Noida. The residents of the high-rise societies claim that they are already paying the highest tariff as they are not getting the benifits of the slab system.

“The builder has taken one single connection from which he is supplying electricity to us. We are not getting any subsidy and are forced to pay the highest tariff. Outages have become a routine in the scorching heat. How can the government think of such a massive hike?” said Anupam, a resident of Ecovillage 2, Greater Noida West.

The industries are already bearing the brunt of outages. Mukul Goyal, who runs a multi-brand car service centre in Greater Noida, claims that any heavy mechanical equipment, which runs on electricity, if shut down during the outage, takes nearly 15-20 minutes to re-start.

“If the outage happens 3-4 times a day, we lose labour for almost an hour, five to ten litres of diesel for generators and manpower to run the generators. It’s happening every day so one can understand the burden on us. Hiking the tariff is not acceptable unless one ensures 24×7 uninterrupted power supply,” said Goyal.

Many industrial areas don’t have piped water supply from the authority. The industries, hence, extract water from ground, which also requires electricity.

Source : India Today