Delhi power row: SC to hear BSES plea against NTPC tomorrow

Zee Media Bureau/Deepak Nagpal

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to hear tomorrow a plea filed by BSES against NTPC notice threatening to cut off power supply for not clearing outstanding dues. The power discom, which supplies electricity to parts of east, central and north Delhi through its subsidiaries BYPL and BRPL, had moved the apex court after state-run NTPC had said that it may be forced to suspend electricity supply to the two Delhi discoms if they fail to clear their outstanding bills in time. After issuing notices to BSES Rajdhani and BSES Yamuna last Saturday, NTPC said that it is in trouble and unless its dues are cleared the company may have to stop power supply to these discoms. "We are in a difficult situation. If we are not paid in time, we will have to regulate nearly 2,000 MW of power, we have (other) buyers for it," chairman and managing director, NTPC, Arup Roy Choudhury, had said. "Tata Power (third power supplier in Delhi) has been paying their bills on time, we never had a problem them. With BSES this is the third time we are facing problems," Choudhury added. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal`s government had written to state power regulator DERC, saying the licences of power discoms should be cancelled if the city experiences major electricity cuts.