Petition No. 1 of 2007
Date of hearing: 30.3.2007

2. The petitioner has stated that the petitioner was required under Clause 13 of the Punjab State Electricity Regulatory Commission (Terms & Conditions for Determination of Tariff) Regulations, 2005 to file ARR/Tariff Petition for the year 2007-08 before the Commission on or before November 30, 2006. It is further stated in the petition that the Board has initiated cost of supply study to comply with the judgement of Appellate Tribunal and that results of study can not be used in their current form to calculate category wise cross subsidy. It is further stated that as the Board is bundled utility and has been submitting combined average cost for its ARR, it is developing a methodology for segregation of costs between three functions i.e. generation, transmission and distribution. The petitioner has further stated that RSD Project is a joint project of Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh and that due to lack of clarity of the al! location of the costs of the project to PSEB, the Board requires additional time to determine the same.
   
   

3. During the processing of ARR & Tariff Application filed by PSEB for the year 2006-07, the Government of Punjab had in its letter dated 3.5.2006 accorded approval for grant of subsidy for free electricity supply to AP consumers in addition to 200 units per month free electricity supply to SC DS consumers with connected load up to 500 watts for the year 2006-07 only. The Government of Punjab has accorded sanction to provide subsidy for current financial year for supplying up to 200 units free electricity during the year 2006-07 to SC DS consumers with connected load of up to 1000 watts ( instead of earlier load of 500 watts) w.e.f. 2.10.2006, vide its letter no. 617 dated January 12/25, 2007 and also to provide subsidy for the current financial year only for free electricity up to 200 units to non-SC Below Poverty Line (BPL) DS consumers with a connected load of up to 1000 watts w.e.f. 1.12.2006, vide its letter no 1385 dated January 25, 2007. In v! iew of this, a letter was written to the Chief Secretary to Government of Punjab on February 21, 2007 requesting therein to intimate Government’s willingness or otherwise to provide subsidies for various categories for the period beyond March 31, 2007 till such time as the new Tariff Order comes into force. No response has been received from the Chief Secretary to the Govt. of Punjab.
   
   

4. The representative of the Board has submitted an application to the effect that extension of time for filing the ARR may be given upto April 20, 2007.
   
   

5. In view of the reasons mentioned in the petition, the Board is allowed to file its ARR/Tariff Petition upto April 16, 2007. As normal procedure for determination of tariff which includes inviting objections from public giving them 30 days’ notice as well as public hearing and validation of data of the Board will have to be observed, therefore, the present tariff structure is ordered to be continued till the date of issue of Tariff Order for the year 2007-08 subject to the condition that the Government continues to provide subsidies for various categories as mentioned in Para 3 above.