Is the Energy Regulatory Commission taking the form of a 'dead horse'!
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Is the Energy Regulatory Commission taking the form of a 'dead horse'!
Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) is not able to do anything except wasting time on the question of increasing gas prices for residential unmetered customers.
Sources say that the regulatory agency is not able to directly cancel such an invalid application due to the fear of the government. Instead, it has been hanging for years. However, the legal documents say that there is no opportunity to increase this price now. BERC is unable to give a decision due to both crises. Energy Division officials say that this unnecessary delay is unprecedented. They even call it illegal. Because it could not take steps to increase the price, BERC has also suspended the application for increasing the amount of gas allocation for unmetered residential customers for a year.
There is no opportunity to hang the application like this for a long time. Either accept or cancel. Such indecisiveness can be suicidal for BERC, say stakeholders.
They say this will render BERC ineffective. At one point, the organization will become a 'dead horse'!
The best opportunity will be taken by those who want to make BERC ineffective. This incident will give them an opportunity to say that BERC is not capable. They can easily say BERC cannot decide. BERC Act has been circumvented before using that shield.
Currently unmetered residential customers in the country are charged a fixed amount of gas bill. The customer has to pay the fixed bill whether he uses it, doesn't use it or uses more.
In this situation, Titas Gas has applied to increase the allocation from 55 cubic meters (Tk. 990) to 76.65 cubic meters in the existing one-stove connection and to increase it from 60 cubic meters (Tk. 1080) to 88.44 cubic meters in the two-stove connection.
If the quantity of gas increases, the price will naturally increase. BERC last hiked gas prices on June 5, 2022. A public hearing was held in March before the order was issued. Then the statistics of customers using prepaid meters of distribution companies show that on average one stove is using 40 cubic meters and two stoves are using a maximum of 50 cubic meters. Based on the usage figures of prepaid customers, one stove is reduced from 73.41 cubic meters and two stoves from 77.41 cubic meters to 55 and 60 cubic meters respectively. Titas objected to BERC's order 10 months later. Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company said in its petition that BERC has fixed the gas allocation without any survey or analysis of data against about 25 lakh unmetered customers. This has increased the technical losses and the government for-profit organization Titas is facing financial losses.
Former member of BERC (Gas 2022) Maqbul E-Elahi Chowdhury told Barta24com that Titas Gas allegations are not true. According to him, this allocation should have been below 50 cubic meters.
Mokbul Chowdhury said that Titas had 3.5 lakh prepaid meters where it was seen that less than 45 cubic meters were used. It is known only by looking at the bill information of the prepaid meter. You don't need to know rocket science for this.
There are about 44 lakh residential customers across the country, out of which about 5 lakh use prepaid meters. Evidence of prepaid meter users does not in any way support the claims of the gas companies. Most of the statistics show that prepaid customers are using less than 30 cubic meters of gas on an average. That information is flashing at your fingertips. Not only had that statistics, BERC conducted a survey in 2019 with BIDS (Bangladesh Development Research Institute). The main objective was to provide a snapshot of gas usage by residential prepaid meter users and unmetered customers.
A survey was conducted on the customers of 6 companies in the country. That report is also in hand of BERC.
However, the report has been suppressed by the company for mysterious reasons. In December 2019, BIDS Senior Research Fellow Dr. Nazneen Ahmed and her team submitted that report. The report highlights the variation in usage by small households, large households and distribution companies and even between meters and non-meters.
According to the report of the survey conducted on 1054 residential customers in 13 districts, single burner prepaid meter users are using 35.5 cubic meters and two burners are using 59.3 cubic meters of gas. On an average, 57.9 cubic meters of gas were used by meter users. And non-meter customers used an average of 56 meters of gas. Despite having so much information, the distribution companies have taken the initiative to cut the pockets of 39 lakh unmetered customers. And despite knowing everything, BERC cannot show the courage to cancel the application.
There are many precedents in the past for rejecting incomplete and unfair proposals in the commission itself. But now the commission is walking on the path of unnecessary controversy. The concerned said that there is no precedent of hanging any price increase proposal for 1 year before.
Regarding the delay in the application of Titas Gas, BERC Chairman Nurul Amin told Barta24.com that they were asked to submit some documents due to lack of application. They delayed the payment because of the time taken. After that, Director Gas was appointed as a member of a committee who scrutinized and gave a report. The report is being worked on.
When asked about the legal aspects of being suspended for a year, he claimed that there was no exception.
But critics say, BERC is indecisive because of fear of the government. A major reason for the commission's fear is that the government clipped BERC's wings and caged it just when its wings were growing. In 2023, by amending the law, government decided to fix the price of gas and electricity by executive order. As a result the quasi-judicial institution has practically become unemployed. Some are even calling the commission a ‘dead horse’ now.
BERC was established as a neutral and quasi-judicial autonomous body through the Energy Regulatory Commission Act in 2003. The commission was established in 2009 to ensure accountability and consumer rights of gas and electricity distribution companies. So far 11 regulations have been formulated. Another 12 regulations have been pending approval for more than a century. BERC was fixing prices only at consumer level of gas and at wholesale and consumer level of electricity as the regulations giving power to fix prices of all types of fuel were pending. The price of fuel oil has always been given by the executive order of the Energy and Mineral Resources Division. The responsibility of which never came to the hands of the regulatory body.
