Variations in losses shown by power ministry: CAG

Expressing concern over implementation of a scheme meant for reducing Aggregate Technical and Commercial losses, government auditor CAG has flagged variations in figures for these losses in various documents presented by power ministry before Parliament. CAG is comptroller and auditor general.

In its report tabled in Parliament on Thursday, CAG also observed there were instances of diversion of R-APDRP funds and overlapping of schemes were noticed in some states. R-APDRP was launched in December 2008 as a continuation of APDRP (Accelerated Power Development and Reforms Programme).

"Variations were noticed in the AT&C losses presented in various documents by the Minter of Power to Parliament. The methodology used for calculating the AT&C losses, though laid down, was not followed uniformly leading to varying estimates of the AT&C losses," CAG said.

The programme envisaged sustainable reduction of AT&C losses, establishment of reliable and automated system for collection of accurate base line data, adoption of Information Technology in the area of energy accounting, mapping all power distribution assets, indexing and metering all consumers for better billing efficiency.

CAG stated that as against Rs 28,424 crore provided for the scheme in the XI and XII Plans periods, only Rs 12,415.04 crore was actually budgeted during 2008-09 to 2014-15 which was only 43.68 per cent of the envisaged amount.