TRS govt to oppose NDA’s new power bill

Hyderabad: The Telangana government has decided to oppose the proposed Electricity (Amendment) Bill, 2020, to be brought in by the NDA government. The TRS government feels the Centre is trying to usurp state’s powers apart from creating problems, especially payment of subsidies which the state government is offering to various categories of consumers. Also, the proposed bill subsumes powers of states to appoint regulatory commission chiefs and proposes to privatise distribution of electricity supply.

The TRS government has a love-hate relationship with the Centre. It supported Prime Minister Narendra Modi on combating Covid-19 like ‘Janata Curfew’, lockdown, ‘tali-thali’ and 9-pm blackout call, but opposed the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), National Population Register (NPR) and National Register of Citizens (NRC). “As ‘electricity’ is in the Concurrent List (subjects