NTPC extends payment deadline of outstanding dues for discoms till March 17

State-owned power giant NTPC has decided to extend the deadline for defaulting discoms for making payment of outstanding dues till Tuesday next week, post which electricity supplies will be snapped.

NTPC has given this breather to the defaulting discoms in view of Holi festival on Tuesday after some discoms assured that they will clear the dues.

Later last month, the NTPC had given notices to these discoms for making payment of overdue outstanding amounts, saying that power supply would be cut on from midnight tonight.

An outstanding becomes overdue after 60 days of rasing the bill against power supplied to a discoms or state. The gencos generally charge penal interest on these overdue amounts.

According to the notices available on the company's portal, these defaulting discoms are in Uttar Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Jammu & Kashmir, Delhi, Odisha, Bihar, Manipur, Mizoram, Kerala, Sikkim and Puducherry.

"Due to mounting outstanding dues of around Rs 10,950 crore, the NTPC has issued (power cut) regulation notices to various beneficiaries to be made effective 0000hrs of March 10, 2020. Subsequently, based on request of beneficiaries and due to festival of Holi on March 10, the NTPC has extended the date of Regulation to be effective from 0000hrs of March 18, 2020," a source told PTI.

"This is an ongoing process and the NTPC is receiving encouraging response from almost all the beneficiaries and it is hopeful of receiving the outstanding amount in time to avoid regulation," the source added.

According to the notices, the NTPC had planned to cut 16,475 MW power supply to these discoms in different states.

Among the states and union territories, Jammu & Kashmir utility total outstanding dues were the highest at Rs 3,619.93 crore followed by Uttar Pradesh at Rs 3,274.51 crore, Telangana at Rs 3,138.55 crore as per the notices served last month.