A video of Delhi's Power Minister Atishi announcing that the subsidy given on electricity in the union territory would be terminated has been revived on social media and is being misleadingly shared as a fallout of large parts of the city being flooded this week.
The Arvind Kejriwal led Aam Aadmi Party is facing flak after several parts of the national capital were severely waterlogged as the water level of the Yamuna river breached 208.6 meters, a level not surpassed in over four decades.
The video, showing Atishi announcing an end to the subsidies, has been culled and has been taken from a press conference she gave in April this year.
These posts can be seen below. It has the caption in Hindi, "Delhi's free electricity has stopped".
The caption in this video also indirectly refers to ongoing floods in Delhi and the surrounding areas.
More posts can be seen here.
FactCheck
The video has been shared misleadingly as recent. The Government of Delhi has not announced that it would be withdrawing its subsidies on electricity recently.
It has been culled from a larger press conference that Atishi gave on April 14. In her press conference, she alleged that while the Legislative Assembly and the government had cleared the subsidy allocation for the ongoing financial year (2023 - 2024), the Lieutenant Governor had not yet cleared that file. Therefore, the government had no option but to withdraw the subsidy starting the next day.
She also showed several letters by discoms written to the government stating that they would be hiking tariffs since they had not received any intimation on a subsidy being provided on the price of electricity.
Her full press conference can be seen below. The video that is circulating online is from the first 1 minute and 26 seconds of the video. She starts explaining the reasons behind the subsidy being withdrawn after that, which the viral video does not include.
The impasse, however, did not last long.
On the same day as Atishi's press conference, Saxena's office said that he had already signed the file a day before, instead countering the Government of Delhi by saying that it had delayed sending the file to his office given how crucial the matter was.
The Government of Delhi is headed by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal of the Aam Aadmi Party. His government often finds itself at odds with the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi - the nominal head of the union territory - with respect to legislative and executive decisions due to political differences between the two.
The Government of Delhi announced a power electricity scheme in 2019 that was backed by subsidies, that would ensure that those consuming less than 200 units of electricity would not have to pay any amount on their electricity bill. For those consuming between 201 units and 400 units of electricity, the power bill would be reduced by 50 percent.
In changes made last year, the Government of Delhi would require those who wished to avail of the subsidy to explicitly opt-in to the scheme, with fresh applications to be made every year.
Reportedly, since October 1, 2022, 84% of 58.71 lakh eligible consumers have opted-in to the scheme.
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