Expressing strong discontent over the hike in power tariff,  YSRCP  chief YS Jaganmohan Reddy alleged that the Telugu Desam government has gone back on its electoral promises and cheated the people of the state.

Showing a copy of the TDP manifesto in the Assembly, Jagan reminded the government that TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu had assured the people that he would not hike power tariff. After coming to power, Naidu broke his promise and went ahead with the power tariff hike, imposing burden on the common man, Jagan criticised.

The YSRCP chief was at a loss, trying to find the rationale behind the tariff hike at a time when the prices of coal were falling both in the domestic and international markets. He also challenged Naidu to prove that the power tariff was hiked during the YSR regime and said if he failed to do so, he should resign. In this regard, Jagan blamed Naidu for purchasing power at exorbitant prices from private companies.

Earlier, Chandrababu Naidu made it clear that the proposed power tariff hike would affect only 16 per cent of the consumers. He said that about 84 per cent of the domestic consumers who utilise below 200 units would not get affected by the tariff hike.

Apart from the households, the Chief Minister said, agriculture, aquaculture allied activities and small and medium scale industries were also exempted from the hike.  Naidu elaborated that with this hike, the government would get only about Rs 950 crore. He said that the government was helpless as the power sector was incurring huge losses. “In order to maintain world-class standards in power sector,  there is an urgent need to improve our infrastructure and put in place cutting edge technology wherever it is required. For that, the government has to invest more funds on a long-term basis. Keeping this in view to ensure quality of power supply as per international standards,  it has been decided to effect the power tariff hike,” Naidu explained.  Naidu assured the  farmers that providing good quality power to agriculture for nine hours a day was the government’s first priority. Efforts were also on provide uninterrupted and quality power to domestic and industrial consumers. Drawing the House attention to the vast transmission and distribution losses, he listed out measures like provision of Light Emitting Diode (LED) lights to households and efforts to cut back on commercial and technical losses. He urged the people to beware of power theft, which was also a huge dent on the resources of the power utilities.

However, Jagan who threw a challenge at Naidu did not wait for his reply and staged a walkout before Naidu gave a reply to the debate, saying that Naidu would not change his mindset.

 Reacting to Jagan’s behavior Naidu said that it was very difficult to understand the  behavior of the Opposition Leader. Naidu observed that many a time, Jagan walked out from the House without a valid reason. He maintained that the government was not answerable to Jagan, but to the people.