New Delhi, Dec 7 (IANS): Union Minister for Power and New & Renewable Energy R.K. Singh told the Parliament on Thursday that the losses of DISCOMs have reduced substantially and the country's power sector has become viable.

The Aggregate Technical & Commercial (AT&C) losses of DISCOMS which were 21.61 per cent in 2017-18 have come down to 16.42 per cent in 2021-22, the minister said in a written reply.

He attributed this to a number of steps taken by the Government which include putting in place rules to ensure payment for any subsidy in time, ensuring that the tariffs are up to date and reducing the late payment surcharge.

The other measures include ensuring that the GENCOs are paid on time and putting in place revised prudential norms providing that no DISCOM or GENCO of a stat government will be able to get loans from PFC/REC if the DISCOM is making a loss, unless the DISCOM, with the approval of the

state government, works out a plan for loss reduction.

This plan has to be filed with the central government, and the loss reduction trajectory has to be adhered to.

The incentive of additional borrowing has also been extended to DISCOMS that implement loss reduction measures.

The minister also said that at present there is no proposal to implement uniform electricity pricing throughout the country.

However, the government is promoting competition through Power Exchanges.

Uniform tariff is discovered on the Power Exchange for a specific time block of the day.

Accordingly, to this extent, for the power procured by the distribution utilities from Power Exchanges, the price of electricity remains uniform, except in case of market splitting.