No power cuts for Delhi just yet as SC stays NTPC threat

The threat of power cuts hanging over the head of Delhi residents abated on Friday, as the Supreme Court directed the National Thermal Power Corp not to cut electricity supply to the city-state's power distributing companies (discoms) run by Anil Ambani's Reliance Infrastructure till 26 March.

Residents were facing a reported power cut of 10-12 hours a day as NTPC threatened to cut supply to the two Reliance discoms over non-payment of over Rs300 crore in dues.

The apex court directed the BSES to pay Rs50 crore within two weeks and posted the case for final hearing on 26 March. Till then, State-owned NTPC will continue to supply power.

Observing that it is the consumers who suffer due to fight between two firms, a bench headed by Justice S S Nijjar directed NTPC not to discontinue the power supply till the matter is heard.

The distribution companies had on Thursday approached the Supreme Court against the NTPC's notice threatening to cut power supply for not clearing outstanding dues.

Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the distribution companies, submitted that the Delhi government has not paid Rs15,000 crore which it owed to the firms.

He said that the recent move of the state government (now run by Arvind Kejriwal's populist Aam Admi Party) to audit the firms is politically motivated, and he won't mind if the distribution companies are nationalised.

The bench then observed that the amount of Rs.300crore which is to be paid to NTPC is a small amount for Reliance.

The NTPC had last week issued notices to the BSES Rajdhani and the BSES Yamuna on the issue of payment security mechanism and non-payment of outstanding dues to the NTPC.