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The very fact that it took more than 70 years post-independence for electricity to reach every village speaks volumes about the mess the sector has been
in. Forget villages, even metro cities, and most state capitals still have to face load shedding. The entire problem in the power sector can be summed
up in three words - vote bank politics. Politicians of all stripes have refrained from increasing tariff for fear of upsetting their vote banks. Besides
this, blatant theft of power, at times under the patronage of political parties, is at the root cause of the problems in the power sector. Many schemes
launched by various governments failed to achieve their desired goal because none of them dared to go anywhere close to the root cause. Ultimately it
was the taxpayer who had to foot the bill of the huge bailouts. This, however, changed in November 2015 when the Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (UDAY)
scheme for reviving the discoms was launched in November 2015. At the time of the launch, the combined annual (FY16) losses of these entities were a staggering
Rs 52,000 crore. Apart from Gujarat, almost every state electricity board in the country was making losses. Reports now say that electricity distribution
companies (discoms) in four states -Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Haryana and Andhra Pradesh - are now profitable. These four states now have a combined profit
of Rs 1,565.5 crore in FY18 compared with an aggregate loss of Rs 10,203 crore in FY17 by these states. One of the biggest reason that these SEBs have
in. Forget villages, even metro cities, and most state capitals still have to face load shedding. The entire problem in the power sector can be summed
up in three words - vote bank politics. Politicians of all stripes have refrained from increasing tariff for fear of upsetting their vote banks. Besides
this, blatant theft of power, at times under the patronage of political parties, is at the root cause of the problems in the power sector. Many schemes
launched by various governments failed to achieve their desired goal because none of them dared to go anywhere close to the root cause. Ultimately it
was the taxpayer who had to foot the bill of the huge bailouts. This, however, changed in November 2015 when the Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (UDAY)
scheme for reviving the discoms was launched in November 2015. At the time of the launch, the combined annual (FY16) losses of these entities were a staggering
Rs 52,000 crore. Apart from Gujarat, almost every state electricity board in the country was making losses. Reports now say that electricity distribution
companies (discoms) in four states -Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Haryana and Andhra Pradesh - are now profitable. These four states now have a combined profit
of Rs 1,565.5 crore in FY18 compared with an aggregate loss of Rs 10,203 crore in FY17 by these states. One of the biggest reason that these SEBs have
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