The cabinet has cleared a Rs 1.9 lakh crore-debt recast package for state power distribution utilities, most of which are inefficient and have huge accumulated losses. A similar bailout was given to them in 2003 as a “one-time” financial clean-up exercise. Had the earlier breather been of any help, the state electricity boards (SEBs) would not have accumulated so much losses again.

Is it proper to keep debt-accumulating SEBs alive at the cost of subjecting consumers to bigger power bills? Should consumer be made to pay for institutional inefficiencies?