In wake of the situation arising out of Covid-19, the state cabinet on Wednesday decided to provide relief to power consumers across the state.
DEHRADUN: In wake of the situation arising out of Covid-19, the state cabinet on Wednesday decided to provide relief to power consumers across the state. For hotel and restaurant owners, the state cabinet has decided to waive off the fixed charges for a period of three months. The interest of pending dues on 20,000 private tubewell owners has been waived off for three months from April to June. The fixed demand charge of industrial consumers has also been deferred for three months. The loss in earnings to the tune of Rs 17.64 crore thus accrued by the power corporation would be compensated for by the state government, officials said.
Sharing details, urban development minister and state government spokesperson Madan Kaushik said, “For commercial consumers like hotels and restaurants, the cabinet has decided to not take the fixed charges for a period of three months — April to June. They will have to pay for only the power consumed by them. For 20,000 private tubewell owners, the cabinet has approved to not take the interest on the pending arrears for a period of three months. Presently, the pending arrears are worth Rs 156 crore and the decision will cost Rs 3.64 crore to the state government,” Kaushik said.
He added that in order to provide relief to industrial consumers, the cabinet has deferred their fixed demand charge for a period of three months. “The state government would face a loss of Rs 8 crore through this move,” he added.
Besides, the government will provide a one per cent rebate to all power consumers who were paying their bill online on time. This, Kaushik said, was being done in order to ensure timely receipt of dues.
In other decisions, the state government has extended the deadline for inspection and examination of boilers units under the Indian Boilers Act, 1923. The deadline has been extended to June this year. The inspection and examination of boilers can be done by government authorities or third party, Kaushik said.
The cabinet has also given a nod for an ordinance for adopting the Agricultural Produce and Livestock Contract Farming (Promotion and Facilitation Act, 2018 in the state. “The Centre has already brought this Act and we had to implement it in Uttarakhand. Therefore, a nod was given for an ordinance,” said Kaushik.
Further, to remove obstacles in promotions, the cabinet approved the merger of health department clerks at district and directorate level and it would be now considered as the same cadre. Kaushik said that the government was also trying to open up religious pilgrimage activities and is consulting with Centre in this regard.
Source: energy.economictimes.indiatimes
