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Indrani Dutta

KOLKATA, Oct. 7

THE RPG-controlled CESC Ltd will seek a review of its tariff for 2002-03, shortly Mr Sanjiv Goenka, company Vice-Chairman, has said.

CESC, which will have to rework its accounts on the basis of the tariff rates (for 2000-01 and 2001-02) that would now be decided by the West Bengal Electricity Regulatory Commission (as directed by the Supreme Court), had not filed any tariff review petition for this fiscal with WBERC. Mr Goenka said that the date for the company's 2001-02 annual general meeting would be fixed only after reworking the accounts.

He said that it was premature to comment on the judgement delivered by the apex court on Thursday as the details were yet to be available. "We respect the judgement,'' he said.

CESC had reported a provisional loss of Rs 304 crore in 2001-02 which was 76 per cent higher than that of the previous year. CESC had said that the losses were higher due to poor average realisation on account of the adverse revision given by WBERC.

After they won a tariff review petition against WBERC in the Calcutta High Court in May 2002, CESC effected upward revision in tune with the High Court judgement, which was in their favour.

The tariff level which is to be reworked by WBERC on the directives of the Supreme Court are expected to be lower and CESC may have to forego a part of the Rs 350 crore additional revenue that it had hoped to mop up in the current fiscal based on arrear collection as well as raising of current bills.

Saregama's Hindi film: Turning to another loss-making group outfit, Saregama India Ltd (SIL), Mr Goenka said that the SIL's first film - a Hindi one - is expected to be signed within this month. It would be a roughly Rs 10 crore venture starring a popular Bollywood hero (who Mr Goenka hinted was currently in a spot). He said that the film would have a new and young director and two female leads.

He said that Saregama would also sign up its first Hindi soap shortly. SIL was already running Tamil serials on Sun TV, which had very good ratings, he said.

The TV software business and the earnings from the deal with Warner Brothers which is contributing over 10 per cent of SIL's present turnover will help pull the company back to the black by 2002-03, according to Mr Goenka. He said SIL was expected to prune within the next five months the Rs 25 crore loss that it had reported in 2001-02.

New tariffs unlikely before Dec

THE new sets of tariffs for the private sector power utility CESC Ltd are unlikely to be ready before December.

The West Bengal Electricity Regulatory Commission (WBERC), which is now studying the Supreme Court order, will need some time to recast the tariffs keeping the Supreme Court benchmarks in mind.

WBERC sources told Business Line that, as things stand now, the tariffs would be higher than the ones fixed by the Commission last November, but will be lower than what was structured by the Calcutta High Court in its May 2002 order.

"We feel that tariffs will be higher by around 50 paise on an average than what was set by the Commission, on account of the higher T&D allowed by the Supreme Court as well as the higher project cost for the BudgeBudge power plant,'' sources said.

However since the tariff would be lower than the High Court rates which were struck down by the apex court, CESC would need to make some refunds.

WBERC, which had roped in the Hyderabad-based Administrative Staff College of India for consultation on the tariff structure for FY 2001 and 2002, will do the exercise with its internal experts this time. "We have now developed the expertise in-house,'' sources said.

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