The purpose of the Electricity Act-2003 is to deregulate Indian Power Industry and finally hand over the system to private operators for making profit. This measure will put the power sector in disarray and the result would be power cost will be raised to unaffordable levels and power crisis will continue to haunt the country. The rural areas would be ignored since the operators will not get sizeable profit. Whatever deficiency is now being experienced is due to the non-implementation of the Electricity Supply Act 1948 strictly. Whatever difficulty is now found could have been corrected with the required amendments in the said Act. Instead this new bill is sought to be enacted without seeking and caring for the opinions from the experts in the field.

The purpose of the Electricity Act-2003 is to deregulate Indian Power Industry and finally hand over the system to private operators for making profit. This measure will put the power sector in disarray and the result would be power cost will be raised to unaffordable levels and power crisis will continue to haunt the country. The rural areas would be ignored since the operators will not get sizeable profit. Whatever deficiency is now being experienced is due to the non-implementation of the Electricity Supply Act 1948 strictly. Whatever difficulty is now found could have been corrected with the required amendments in the said Act. Instead this new bill is sought to be enacted without seeking and caring for the opinions from the experts in the field.

The Ministry of Power did not seek the advice CEA in arriving at the decision for the need to enact ERA - 1998. The decision to propose enactment of EB-2003 has also been taken in the same manner. Ministries have used examples of regulators in USA and other countries for CERC and SERC which are not comparable at all. Similarly countries who have surplus generating capacity have been used as examples for policies in India, which has chronic power shortages.

California experience is known the world over. Unplanned development and shortage in generation capacity can exploit the consumers most. Why should consumers and industry bear the increase in tariffs caused due to increasing theft and uncontrolled rise in project cost?

MOP has been using advice of handpicked inexperienced consultants to justify their decisions. They have not shown concern for the impact of their decisions on the supply of power at affordable price and upward revision of tariffs. Ministries are depending on foreign consultants and not using experience and expertise of national and state institutions of CEA and SEBs to find path for reforms. This is proving too costly in terms of inefficiencies and high cost of projects.

Planning commission in Report for Fy 2001-02 states " It is observed from the analysis that financial position of SEBs has deteriorated over the years. In order to enable SEBs to meet the power demand efficiently; they need to become autonomous, professional and commercially viable". This statement after 12 years of reforms shows basic defects in our decision-making system.

Policy of privastisation and focus on urban distribution has hit the rural community and the poor. Electrification of villages and energisation of agricultural pump sets have sharply slowed down during the decades of reforms after Fy 1990-91.

Deregulation/restructuring of retail electricity market isn't going smoothly anywhere, from Ontario to the UK to the U.S. (with the possible exception of Texas), as per news and notes of Global Energy Business and Technology January/February,2003, Vol.5, No.1.