Substack

Friday, November 2, 2012

Second best policy frameworks to mitigate corruption

I have a new column, Governance Agenda, in Pragati which this time talks about second best policy frameworks in corruption.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Reliance Power would not have bidded for such a low rates from their UMPPs unless they were assured of the coal. But there are instances in the allocation which have to be taken seriously and as rightly pointed out an audit on final outcomes would clear all the doubts. Recent ruling by Supreme court also corroborates that all the natural resources cannot be sold only for profit maximisation

Urbanomics said...

Thanks praveen for the comment. As you said, the two UMPPs were given on Case II bids, specifying the fuel sources. but the point I was trying to make is that it led to ultra-low tariffs when subjected to a competitive downstream process. the ultimate objective from coal block allocation was not resource mobilization, but delivery of cheap power in quick time.

if all the discretionary allotments, even if done with malafide, had mandatory clauses obliging the developers to deliver power to utilities at the cost-plus tariff decided by the respective ERC's, that would have by itself taken care of the larger objective.