Haryana not to impose monthly minimum charge on domestic power consumers
Currently, ₹115 on per kilowatt load is charged per month; decision to come into force from next billing cycle and benefit domestic consumers in urban and rural areas
The Nayab Singh Saini-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has decided not to impose ₹115 minimum monthly charges (MMC) on electricity consumers in rural as well as urban areas falling in Tariff Category-1 with domestic connected load up to two kilowatt (kW), it is learnt.
The electricity distribution companies levy the MMC on consumers where the electricity consumption per billing cycle is below a specified limit.
In Tariff Category-1 where the monthly consumption is less than 200 units, the minimum monthly charges in Haryana are ₹115 per kilowatt (kW) in a load up to 2 kW (1 kW is equal to 1,000 watts).
The move to do away with the MMC of the domestic power connection comes four months after then chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar, who also held the finance portfolio, announced in his 2024-25 budget proposals on February 23 to provide relief to the “poorest of the poor.”
The decision comes close on the heels of the Lok Sabha election verdict in which the tally of BJP in Haryana came down to five seats, down from 10 seats the party had won in a clean sweep in 2019 general elections.
“I propose to eliminate the MMC for Tariff Category-1 consumers with domestic connected load of up to 2 kW,” Khattar (now Union power minister) had stated in the assembly, pointing out that this step will provide a relief of about ₹180 crore to the poorest of the poor families.
According to a top Haryana government functionary, the decision will come into force from the next billing cycle and the relief consumers may get could be from minimum 2% to maximum 91% ( ₹5 to ₹190) in their total electricity bill.
“The decision to do away with levying ₹115 per kilowatt MMC on domestic connection and on a load up to two kilowatt will benefit about 9.5 lakh poor families,” said the officer quoted above, on the condition of anonymity.
As per the plan to roll out this policy decision, the consumers will pay only for the power units consumed. For instance, earlier if a family with 1 kW load consumed 30 units in a month, the bill used to be ₹115 which now will come down to ₹60 only as MMC will not be applicable.
Similarly, a consumer with 2kW load and after consuming 30 units in a month had to pay ₹230 as MMC per kilowatt load was ₹115. Under the new billing cycle, this bill will come down to ₹60 as per unit levy is ₹2 and no MMC will be levied.
In Haryana, the power tariff from zero to 50 units is ₹2 per unit, and ₹2.50 per unit is charged if the consumption is between 51 and 100 units. In case the per month electricity consumption is in the bracket of 101-150 units, the cumulative tariff is ₹2.75 per unit in which units are counted from zero to 150 for billing.
The Haryana Electricity Regulatory Commission (HERC), the apex body to determine the electricity tariff, had not recommended any hike in the tariff in its 2024-25 order, giving relief to over 78.57 lakh electricity consumers across Haryana. In 2023-24 also the HERC had not recommended any increase in power tariff.
Though the HERC had issued the tariff order for the 2024-25 financial year without proposing any hike in the existing electricity rates across all the categories of power consumers, it had directed the Discoms to improve their operational efficiency and reduce aggregate transmission and commercial loss from 12% to 10%.
As per official records, Haryana government will provide ₹5,941 crore subsidy for agricultural consumers in this fiscal.
