Amendments in Electricity Act 2003: Where the Gap Lies?

Highlights: • Indian power sector is presently governed by Electricity Act 2003 • The Act has failed to address both distribution inefficiencies and energy security. • To provide a policy push, amendments in the parent act have been suggested. • EAB 2014 and EAA 2018 are the amendment documents rolled out so far. • The paper draws out gaps between proposed amendments to make policy recommendations. -- Abstract: Economic forces of the market drives any restructuring. Same is the case with power sector where presence of any economic inefficiency advocates the liberalization. Since the enactment of the 'Electricity Act 2003', Indian Power Sector had been through transformation phase to separate loss making vertically integrated 'State Electricity Boards' into 'Generation', 'Transmission' and 'Distribution' utilities. Fifteen years have been conceded to witness milestones in many directions. However, concerns pertaining to 'monopolistic inefficiencies of distribution sector' as well as 'energy security' could not be addressed properly by the principle act. This drew the attention of policy makers and they recommended amendments in the act to provide a policy push. Indian Power Sector has seen two documents for suggesting these amendments 'Electricity Amendment Bill 2014' and 'Draft Electricity Amendment Act 2018'. This paper does analyze both of the documents for the similarities and differences and thus provides insights about the existing gaps. The paper recommends policy makers that how these gaps can be narrowed down before finally putting up the amendments in Indian Parliament.