Punjab: Nod to 600 units of free power to every household per billing cycle

The Punjab Cabinet on Wednesday accorded approval to giving 600 units of free power to every household per billing cycle in the state with effect from July 1.

A decision to this effect was taken in a meeting of the council of ministers held here under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, an official statement said.

Punjab has a two-month billing cycle for power supply.

"All domestic consumers in the state will be eligible to get zero bills if their consumption is up to 600 units in every billing cycle. This will give a big reprieve to the domestic consumers who have to hitherto shell out huge money every month in form of power tariff," the statement said.

"As per the decision, Scheduled Castes (SC), non-SC BPL and Backward Class (BC) domestic consumers who are currently eligible for free 400 units (per billing cycle) of power will also get subsidy of 600 units now," said the statement.

Freedom fighters of Punjab and their successors up to grandchildren who are domestic consumers and currently eligible for free 400 units of power will also get subsidy of 600 units per billing cycle.

In case, the consumption of SC, non-SC BPL, BC and Freedom Fighter categories exceeds units per billing cycle then they will pay only for units consumed in addition to 600 units along with full fixed charges, meter rentals and government levies as applicable, it said.

Bhagwant Mann had last week said his government is fulfilling a guarantee made to people of the state as from July 1 each household will be getting 300 units of free electricity every month.

Mann had also said the government has also waived arrears of electricity bills pending till December 31, 2021 of all households.

In the Wednesday's meeting, the Cabinet also gave green signal for waiving pending arrears of all domestic consumers as on December 31, 2021 and unpaid up to June 30.

"This move will give relief to around 28.10 lakh domestic consumers with a total benefit of Rs 1,298 crore," said the statement.

Giving 300 units of free electricity was one of the major poll promises of the Aam Aadmi Party during the Punjab assembly elections. The party's national convener Arvind Kejriwal had promised free electricity up to 300 units for the state in June last year.