Power tariff hike move protested

Workers and supporters of the Samajwadi Party (SP) led by State president Rabi Behera held a demonstration before the Assembly on Wednesday protesting a proposed power tariff hike in the State.

They demanded a Whitepaper on power sector reform, 200 units free power to each consumer, CAG audit and Energy audit besides no load shedding and low voltage and submitted a memorandum to Energy Minister Dibyasankar Mishra. The OSEB which was running with Rs 300-crore loss was broken into private companies and generation transmission and distribution were separated for better energy to consumers.

Those companies also gave assurance for reduction of transmission loss to 15%. But after 26 years of reforms, the consumers are still not getting uninterrupted quality power supply at cheaper rate, alleged the party.