After facing continuous attacks from the Opposition as well as its own MLAs on the power tariff hike, the Delhi government has decided to get accounts of discoms (private power supply companies) audited by CAG. The Delhi
government has examined the recent orders of DERC reiterating the decision of the CAG audit of three discoms for certain financial years. Accordingly, the government has agreed to occasionally conduct the CAG audit as pointed out by DERC to show its conviction for auditing by CAG.
Earlier, Congress MLA Mukesh Sharma, in the Monsoon Session of the Delhi Assembly, has asked the government to conduct such audit of the discoms to prevent any kind of corruption in electricity bills. The government, on Tuesday, agreed with the suggestions. “Delhi Electric Regulatory Commission had advised the Delhi government to get accounts of BRPL, BYPL and NDPL audited by CAG for at least last three years from 2007 to 2010. DERC further stated that during the course of public hearing on tariff petitions filed by the private Distribution Companies, many of stakeholders submitted that there seems to be a large number of anomalies in the accounts of three private Discoms of Delhi,” said an officer adding that the city government has welcomed the advise of DERC and stated that an audit by CAG will put an end to all suspicions in the minds of people. Later, the department of power had informed DERC that as per Tariff Policy issued by Government of India, the DERC should institute a system of independent scrutiny of financial and technical data submitted by the licensees.