Dialogue January-March, 2013, Volume 14 No. 3

India’s Energy Security:  'The Government's Role

Lydia Powell*

Introduction

In the next few decades, non OECD countries led by China and to a lesser extent India are expected to account for over 70 percent of global economic output, 90 percent of the increase in population and 90 percent of the global increase in energy demand by 2035.1 China is expected to become the world’s largest energy oil consumer and importer and account for over 50 percent of global coal production by 2035. Overall China is projected to consume 70 percent more energy than the United States by 2035. Though India’s energy demand is unlikely to match that of China in scale, growth in energy demand is expected to be faster in India. India is projected to become the world’s largest coal importer by 2020 and China and India together are anticipated to account for over 50 percent of global increase in power generation.

India’s rise to the top of the energy consumption tables is not surprising; India is merely taking its rightful place given its size in terms of population numbers, its growth rates and the energy needed to fuel this growth. What is surprising is that India will continue to be an energy poor country in 2035 and its per capita energy consumption will touch 1 tonne of oil equivalent (toe) considered to be the bare minimum for decent quality of life only in 2035. At least 10 percent of India’s primary energy consumption will continue to be met by traditional fuels such as firewood and dried animal dung by 2035 even if India continues to demonstrate high economic growth rates.

Why is India always short of energy? Why is energy poverty persisting in India? What were its energy strategies? What did it get wrong and what did it get right?

Plans and Strategies

In the early years after independence, the driving concern for India was food security rather than energy security. At the time of partition, India with 82 percent of the population of undivided British India got only half the canal system carrying 400,000 cusecs of water and less than half of 24 million acres of land irrigated by state owned canals.2 The 1st and 2nd Plan documents (1947-60) were therefore pre-occupied with strategies for increase in food production and increasing the availability of electricity to facilitate the pumping of ground water for irrigation.3 Under the broad title ‘Irrigation & Power’, elaborate details on current and future irrigation requirement were presented along with strategies and policies to increase area under irrigation. Rural electrification was recommended as a means to arrest large scale migration to urban areas in order to increase rural participation in agriculture. The 3rd Five Year Plan reflected the global pre-occupation with nuclear energy and projected nuclear energy as an option for power generation and a means for improving India’s ‘self-sufficiency’ in the context of energy. The Plan document also described the progress of large hydro projects such as the Bhakra Nangal which were projected as critical components of the nation’s material progress. The 4th and 5th Five Year Plans reflected concerns of post war recovery and highlighted the deteriorating state of power sector finance. Following the oil shocks of the 1970s, the 6th Five Year Plan incorporated a separate section on ‘energy’ in the Plan documents for the first time. ‘Self-sufficiency’ was the driving theme and development of domestic resources and the need for pricing reforms to conserve energy were among measures emphasized. The 7th Plan continued on the same lines and introduced the concept of oil use intensity, a measure of efficiency in oil use. The 8th and 9th Plans reflected the reform agenda and the thrust on economic growth. Energy was seen as a means for economic growth and the Plan documents emphasized the need to make abundant energy available at affordable prices. The 10th Plan looked at China’s growth rather enviously and argued that energy shortages may become a constraint on economic growth. The 11th Plan (2007-12) continued with the focus on energy for economic growth and the issue of power shortages. It emphasized the need for private sector participation in power generation and also drew attention to the importance of equitable access to energy (Table 1).

Table 1: India’s Energy Preferences from Plan Documents

Plan/            Section                      Key Concern                          Energy

Plan             Theme                                                                       Sources

1st Plan         Irrigation & Power     Food Security, Power             Coal, Hydro

2nd Plan        Irrigation & Power     Food Security, Power             Coal, Hydro

(1955-60)     Chapter 17/30            Generation, Industrialization

3rd Plan         Irrigation & Power     Food Security, Oil                   Coal, Hydro,

(1960-65)     24/35 Minerals &       Exploration, Power                 Nuclear

4th Plan         Irrigation & Flood      Post War Recovery, Food       Coal, Hydro,

(1969-74)     Control Chapter         Security, Power Generation    Nuclear

                     11/23 Power              Power Sector Finances

5th Plan         Resolution on             Power Sector Finances            Coal, Hydro,

(1974-79)     Irrigation & Power                                                     Nuclear

6th Plan         Energy                       Oil Shock, Self Sufficiency,    Coal, Hydro,

7th Plan         Energy Chapter          Exploitation of Gas potential, Coal, Hydro,

(1984-89)     6/21 Environment      Self Sufficiency,                      Oil, Nuclear,

                     & Ecology Chapter                                                    Gas

8th Plan         Energy Chapter 8/19  Energy as Input for                 Coal, Oil,

(1992-97)                                        Development, Efficient            Hydro,

                                                        Technologies for Coal, Price   Nuclear,

                                                        Reforms, Concern over           Gas

                                                        Imports

9th Plan         Energy                       Energy as Input for                 Coal, Hydro,

(1997-2002) Chapter 6/10              Development, Renewable        Oil, Gas,

                                                        Energy Renewable Energy      Nuclear,

                                                        Sources. Investment, Price      Renewables

                                                        Reforms, Concern over

10th Plan       Energy under             Energy Shortage as constraint Coal, Hydro,

(2002-07)     Industry & Services   to Growth, Comparison with  Oil, Gas,

                     Chapter 7.3/10           China, Import of Gas,             Nuclear,    

                     Power under              Exploitation of Non-               Renewables   

                     Infrastructure             Conventional Hydrocarbons,

                     Chapter 8.2/10           Climate Change, Concern

11th Plan       Energy                       Power Shortages, Power         Coal, Hydro,

(2007-12)     Chapter 10/12            Sector Reform, UMPPs,         Oil, Gas,

                                                        Power Markets, Equitable       Nuclear,                                        

                                                        Access to Energy, Concern     Renewables

                                                        over Imports                             

 There were other strategy and policy documents that specifically addressed the energy question. In 1962, almost a decade before the oil crisis provided the global context for the pursuit of ‘energy security’, the first Prime Minister of India set up a Committee on Power & Energy realizing the importance of energy in nation building. The Committee’s report submitted in 1965 mapped energy resources of India and offered suggestions on how they may be utilized.4 Subsequently, the Fuel Policy Committee Report in 1975, the Report of the Working Group on Energy Policy set up by the Planning Commission in 1979, the Report of the Advisory Board on Energy set up in 1985 as well as Research Reports by the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) in 1985 provided data and recommendations broadly on the same lines.5 A striking feature in all the reports was that they offered elaborate projections for wood fuel demand in the future as the decline in wood fuel use in households was apparently not anticipated. An Energy Policy Committee was set up by the Planning Commission in 1995 but its report which essentially projected energy demand for the future was not published in final form.6 

 In 2000, the Hydrocarbon Vision 2025 commissioned by the Prime Minister of India to address the issue of energy security in the context of the hydrocarbon sector (Oil & Gas) was released. The report recommended ‘intensification of exploration efforts and securing acreages in countries having ‘high attractiveness for ensuring sustainable long term supplies’ such as Russia, Iran, Iraq and North Africa.7 The recommendations were repeated with some variations in subsequent documents. The Integrated Energy Policy Report released in 2006 redefined energy security from the perspective of the ‘Individual’ as well as that of the ‘Nation’ for the first time and highlighted the need for equitable access to energy within the nation.8 With regard to the latter perspective where supplies to the nation as a whole are considered, the Report commented that ‘obtaining equity oil, coal and gas abroad do not represent adequate strategies for enhancing energy security beyond diversifying supply sources’9 but also recommended ‘investing in equity oil’ to enhance energy security in subsequent sections.10 The report argued that energy security was about managing risks and identified three broad types of risks: supply risks mainly arising from disruptions in the supply of imported energy but also of domestic energy (such as a strike in Coal India Limited which may disrupt the domestic supply of coal); (2) Market risk which concerns price volatility of imported energy and the consequent input on economy and terms of trade; (3) technical risk arising from threats to domestic energy infrastructure. Maintenance of reserve coal stocks and oil diplomacy were among solutions recommended in the report.

 The 2005 Expert Committee Report on a Road Map for Coal Sector Reforms was based on the premise that coal would remain the mainstay of the Indian Power sector and towards this end the report recommended strategies for reducing coal imports through enhanced domestic production. Beginning with a report by the Standing Committee on Petroleum & Natural Gas by the Lok Sabha Secretariat in 2004 a series of reports on Petroleum Product Pricing (‘Rangarajan Committee Report’ 2006, ‘Chaturvedi Committee Report’ 2008, ‘Kirit Parikh Committee Report’ 2010) argued for domestic pricing reforms citing the growing share of imported oil and the need for India to integrate into the global oil market. There were also a number of reports on the Power Sector, especially on financial reform of the sector. In 2001 a ‘Blue Print for Power Sector Development’ was released by the Ministry of Power which recommended investment in generating capacity, transmission infrastructure and accelerating financial reform in the distribution segment. In 2002 an Expert Committee on State specific reforms set up by the Ministry of Power released a report on Structuring of Accelerated Power Development & Reform Programme (APDRP) and Principles of Financial Restructuring.11 There were also a number of other reports which recommended complete reform of the distribution end of the power sector to facilitate the private capital investment in power generation.

 A new division on ‘energy security’ was created within the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) of the Government of India in 2011 and was designated as ‘the nodal point for energy security related matters involving coordination with line Ministries, Planning Commission, Indian Missions and Posts Abroad, International Organizations and Foreign Missions’.12 The overarching theme in its mandate was that of securing equity investment and bilateral energy deals in energy exporting countries in Africa, Latin America, Central Asia and South East Asia.13 India’s energy problem is presented by the new division primarily as an ‘energy import’ problem which could be addressed through unique supply oriented solutions such as equity investments and bilateral deals.

Plans & Strategies: What have they achieved?

 At the time of independence, more than 90 percent of the population had no access to commercial energy forms.14 There was virtually no oil industry apart from the small refinery at Digboi.15 There were six oil marketing companies in India but their head offices were outside India. Three of the marketing companies were subsidiaries of the international oil majors. The three together controlled 90 percent of the sales of petroleum products to the Indian market. The Digboi refinery with less than half a million tonne capacity and wholly owned by a subsidiary of a British concern, met only 9 per cent of national requirement of kerosene, 11 per cent of petrol and 5 per cent of fuel oil. Over 90 percent of refined petroleum products were imported. India’s power generating capacity was about 1300 MW and served only 10 percent of the population.16 Over 80 percent of commercial energy was derived from coal and coal dominated as the primary fuel for both power generation and transportation (rail). Over 60 percent of the power generating capacity was based on coal while about 37 percent was based on hydro power.17 

 Six decades later, coal’s dominance in India’s primary energy basket continues with coal accounting for over 42 percent of the total primary energy demand. Non-traditional fuels such as biomass and animal dung still account for over 25 percent of India’s primary energy demand which is more than the share of oil at 24 percent.18 Over 25 percent of the Indian population does not have access to electricity and over 75 percent continue to rely on non commercial energy sources such as fuel wood and dried animal dung to meet their cooking fuel needs.19 India’s dependence on international oil companies has declined thanks to changes in the global oil market but India still imports about 79 percent of its crude needs.20 India’s oil imports are likely to increase from the current 4 million barrels per day (mbpd) to over 7 mbpd by 2035.21 

 Despite having the world’s fifth largest coal reserves with over 77 billion tonnes of proved reserves, India’s coal imports are growing.22 In 2011 India is estimated to have imported more than 100 million tonnes of coal and by 2020 India is expected to be the largest coal importer in the world.23 India’s coal import dependence has increased from 6 percent to 13 percent in the last 5-6 years. Till 2005-06, coking coal used to dominate coal imports (about 50 percent) but now its share has declined to 33 percent. Demand-supply gap for coal is expected to grow from the current average level of about 50 MT to more than 250 MT by 2025.24

                 Figure 1: Fuel Shares: India’s primary Energy Basket in 2010

         Source: World Energy Outlook 2011, International Energy Agency

The 5th Plan which coincided with the first oil shock strongly recommended increasing the share of coal as fuel for power generation.25 During the 5th Plan period (1974-79) the outlay for the coal sector was increased to Rs 1025 crores following the recommendations of the Fuel Policy Committee formed after the first oil crisis in 1973-74. This was a ten-fold increase over the outlay during the 4th Plan period.26 The 6th Plan document (1979-84) recommended a strategy of ‘self reliance’ based on coal, hydropower and nuclear energy to reduce the economy’s exposure to crude oil prices. Even though the document cautioned that in per capita terms India’s coal resources were small compared to that of countries like USA, Russia and China, implementation of the strategy of ‘self-reliance’ skewed in favour of coal at the expense of hydro power.27 This was in spite of the Plan documents pointing out the risk of increased foreign exchange exposure on account of import of coal powered generators. Essentially coal use was accelerated without corresponding plans for increase in coal production. Open cast mining which was cheaper and faster grew at the expense of relatively efficient and environmentally friendly under-ground mining. Underground coal production came down from 74 percent in November 1975 to about 10 percent currently. As against the prescribed norm of 40:60 ratio (or not less than 30:70) of opencast and underground coal production, India has now come down to 10:90, a level which cannot be reversed easily.28 

In 1966, hydro power and coal accounted for 45 percent and 48 percent respectively of a total installed capacity of about 9 GW. By 1990, the share of coal based generation capacity increased to 64 percent while the share of hydro power dropped to 28 percent of a total installed capacity of about 63 GW.29 Coal now accounts for over 55 percent of installed power generation capacity and over 69 percent of actual generation (2010-11).30 

In 1960 small and inefficient collieries mined less than 70 million tonnes of coal and the average output in Indian coal mines was 180 tonnes per man year compared to over 4000 tonnes in the USA.31 Despite several technological advancements, output per man-year in India is currently only one eighth of that in Australia (1100 tonnes per man year compared to Australia’s 9000 tonnes).32 

Within the energy sector in India, the nuclear power industry may be said to be unique as it has had a consistent and clearly articulated strategy since its birth in 1948. The sector has stuck to its three stage programme despite many challenges such as its isolation from the global nuclear energy industry on account of its nuclear weapons programme. India’s three stage programme involved the use of uranium in heavy water reactors followed by the reprocessing of the irradiated uranium to obtain plutonium in the first stage. In the second stage, plutonium was to be used in breeder reactors to produce more plutonium and uranium 233. In the third stage the plutonium and uranium were to be used in fast breeder reactors. ndia’s Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) has been consistent in making optimistic projections for nuclear power generating capacity despite not having met the target even once in its sixty year life. The projection in 1948 when India’s nuclear programme was initiated was that by 1980 India would have 8 GW of nuclear capacity.33 In 1962 this was raised to 25 GW, by 1987 which was again raised to over 43 GW, by 2000 in 1987.34 India’s total nuclear capacity stands at less than 5 GW in 2012. Projections for the future continue to remain over-optimistic. In the next 10 years the DAE expects to increase capacity by 15 fold to 63 GW and in the next 40 years (by 2050) it expects to increase capacity by 100 fold to over 450 GW. If achieved this would be more than what the entire world managed to install in the last 60 years (393 GW in 2010) and will be about 76 percent of the total world capacity by 2050 (of 590 GW estimated by the IAEA).35 

Reforming the pricing of energy has been a recurring theme in India’s Plan documents for over two decades but price distortions in the energy sector have only got worse. lectricity and petroleum sector subsidies now each account for 1 to 1.25 percent of GDP which is close to a trillion Indian rupees. Not only is this amount increasing in rupee terms substantially, it is actually increasing as a share of GDP. Fossil fuel consumption subsidies in 2010 rose by 25 percent over 2009, and surpassed $ 40 billion – oil accounted for 47 percent and gas, 23 percent.36 In the last five years losses incurred in the electricity sector were about 179,000 crores (roughly $ 34 billion) primarily on account of the gap between average cost of supply and average revenue realised.37 Though energy prices in India (petroleum and electricity) are among the highest in the world in both absolute and purchasing power parity terms, a large share of the price paid for energy is used to compensate for the economic, administrative and technical inefficiency in producing and delivering energy. Clearly six decades of careful planning have failed to deliver even the basic minimum quantity of energy to its people. Nor has it succeeded in building an efficient system of accessing, producing and delivering energy. Every segment of the energy value chain is facing shortages. There is shortage in primary fuel availability, shortage of end use energy forms such as electricity, shortage in energy infrastructure, shortage in technical efficiency, shortage of commercial efficiency, shortage of social and economic efficiency, shortage of administrative efficiency, shortage of required skills and shortage of investment.

What has gone wrong?

As far as good intentions are concerned, it is difficult to find fault with India’s Five Year Plans and other strategy documents. The objective of increasing access to modern energy services such as electricity to all households is mentioned in almost all of India’s Five Year Plan documents. The First Plan for example, laments that out of 560,000 villages in India only 3000 (0.5 percent or one in 200) were electrified. Six decades later, a similar disappointment over not having achieved the goal of ‘providing electricity to all by 2012’ is reflected in the Working Group Report on the Power Sector for the 12th Plan (2012-17). All Plan and documents also discuss various strategies for augmenting energy supplies in all its forms, improving efficiency, decreasing import dependence and making detailed recommendations on financial allocations that need to be made. However the plans have failed to substantially change key characteristics of India’s energy challenges.

In 1947 high import dependence for petroleum products, control of the oil sector by international oil majors, inefficiency in coal production and extreme energy poverty characterized India’s energy security challenge. Sixty five years later, the basic contours of India’s energy security ‘problem’ such as high import dependence for petroleum and the consequent exposure to volatility of global crude prices, inefficiency in coal production and pervasive energy poverty have hardly changed and if they have changed, it is only in scale.

Despite the meticulous effort put into the ‘Planning’ exercise, it has to be said that the ‘plans’ have failed not only India but also most Indians in the case of energy. The reasons for the failure are easy to identify. The most obvious are common to most planned economies: they are inefficient, they misallocate scarce resources, they constrain innovation and restrict choice. These outcomes need no further elaboration as they have been illustrated in detail in earlier sections. What has not been mentioned yet is that India’s Plans have also let India down in times of global crises. India’s pre-occupation with food security in the 1960s left India totally unprepared for the impact of the oil embargoes of the 1970s. The increase in Government control over India’s energy sector following the oil embargoes meant that India could not appropriate the benefit of stable and low energy prices in the 1980s. The ill thought through embrace of fast track privatisation in the power sector in the 1990s left the power sector in worse shape than before. Investor confidence was almost completely destroyed and the Indian power sector began to be the most cited example for poor performance. Chronic shortages became the norm. ‘Irrational exuberance’ over abundant domestic gas resources presumed to be available at unbelievably low prices in the early 2000s literally destroyed the development of a healthy natural gas industry in India. Demand was simulated while supply was constrained. The low and inflexible price regime that has prevailed in the domestic gas market over the last few decades has thwarted investment in pipeline and re-gasification infrastructure. This has severely limited India’s ability to capitalise on the natural gas revolution that is sweeping the rest of the world today. It is hard to resist a comparison with China in this context. China started the development of its natural gas sector later than India but now it is fully equipped to appropriate a major share of the cheap natural gas available in the global market as it invested in an extensive network of pipelines, re-gasification infrastructure and also successfully rolled out a flexible pricing regime.

One of the less mentioned problems with India’s energy plans is that it does not seek to meet a consistent ‘value’ objective such as delivering low cost modern energy services to consumers through the most efficient means. Instead, energy options are evaluated on the basis of contextual factors such as resource endowments, extrapolation of historic trends, available capabilities and existing international and bilateral relationships. Most of the plans react to either domestic or global developments.

‘Self-reliance’ may be counted as one of the few consistent ‘values’ mentioned in India’s policy documents. However India’s growing reliance on imported oil, gas, coal and nuclear fuel convey that India is either not idealistically committed to this ‘value’ or incapable of implementing any of the suggestions towards ‘self-reliance’. Even the nuclear industry known for its strategy of ‘self-reliance’ is likely to increase its reliance on imported Light Water Reactors and nuclear fuel in the future. ‘Self-reliance’ is also a goal that runs counter to the goal of energy security. In a world that is integrated and connected by trade, promoting self-reliance will exclude India from many global energy options.

The key problem with India’s approach towards energy security is that the Government sees itself as a ‘Great Planner’ and ‘Benevolent Provider’. The former is untrue and the latter is impossible. As a great planner and provider, the Government assumes omniscient qualities of knowing the wants of the people, knowing the energy future and knowing how to get to the future. None of this is realistic. No one in the energy industry foresaw the shale gas revolution, no one foresaw Fukushima; no one has yet foreseen what energy options will be viable in the carbon constrained future. The world of energy is unpredictable and the logical role for the Government is to be a ‘Facilitator’. As a facilitator, the Governments tasks are straight forward: it must keep doors to all energy opportunities widely open and offer a level playing field to a multiple set of players including itself who can exploit those options. At the same time it must wisely supervise and regulate the sector so as to assure that the ‘Benevolent Provider’ is not replaced by the ‘Robber Baron’.

Footnotes

       1  International Energy Agency, 2011, World Energy Outlook 2011 (WEO 2011), all projections for future energy demand in this section are from the WEO 2011

       2  First Five Year Plan Document available on the website of the Planning Commission of India

       3  First an d Second Five Year Plan documents available on the website of the Planning Commission of India

       4  Chopra, S.K. 2004, ‘Energy Policy for India’: Towards Sustainable Energy Security in India in the Twenty First Century’, Oxford & IBH Publishing Co Pvt Ltd, New Delhi

       5  Saxena, N.C. 1997. ‘Wood Fuel Scenario & Policy in India, Food And Agriculture Organization Of The United Nations, FAO, Bangkok, April 1997

       6  Ibid, N 4

       7  Hydrocarbon Vision 2025, Government of India

       8  Integrated Energy Policy, Expert Committee of the Planning Commission, Government of India, 2006, pp XXIV: ‘Energy security: ‘ensuring the continuous availability of commercial energy at competitive prices to support India’s economic growth and meet the lifeline energy needs of its households with safe, clean and convenient forms of energy even if that entails directed subsidies’.

       9  Integrated Energy Policy, Expert Committee of the Planning Commission, Government of India, 2006, pp XXIV

     10  Ibid, pp 9 and 57

     11  Also known as the ‘Deepak Parekh Report’

     12  Instructions provided to the bidders of the position of ‘Institutional Consultant’ to the Energy Security Division of the Ministry of External Affairs, October 2011.

     13  Ibid

     14  Bhagavan, M.R. 1986, ‘India’s Energy Policy into the late 1980s’, Economic & Political Weekly, Volume 21. No 44/45 November 1-8, 1986, pp 1951-54

     15  Historical data and information in this section is taken from ORF Energy News Monitor, Historical Milestones in Oil & Gas sector in India.

     16  First Five Year Plan Document availa ble on the website of the Planning Commission of India

     17  Ibid

     18  World Energy Outlook 2011, International Energy Agency

     19  Census 2011, Government of India

     20  Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell, Government of India

     21  World Energy Outlook 2011, International Energy Agency

     22  Ibid

     23  Import figure for 2011-12 from Reuters (http://in.reuters.com/article/2011/02/03/idINIndia-54617620110203) and import projection from the World Energy Outlook 2011, International Energy Agency

     24  Presentation by ICF International at the 5th India Energy Summit on 28-29 November 2011

     25  Fifth Plan Document available on the website of the Planning Commission of India

     26  Fifth and Sixth Plan Documents available on the website of the Planning Commission of India

     27  “While India has reserves of 176 tonnes of coal per person, USA has 13488 tonnes, USSR 22066 tonnes and China 1168 tonnes” : Sixth Plan Document

     28  Tandon, Gulshan Lal, (Padma Bhushan), Former Chairman (CIL & NLC) at the 3rd J G Kumaramanglam Memorial Lecture, November 2009

     29  Sixth and Seventh Plan Documents available on the website of the Planning Commission of India

     30  Central Electricity Authority, ‘Operating Performance of Generation Stations in the Country during the year 2010-11, Figures correspond to utility based generation.

     31  Economic & Political Weekly, 1967, ‘Half Truths on Coal’, Volume No 13 April 1, 1967 pp 625-626

     32  World Energy Outlook 2011, International Energy Agency

     33  Ramana, M V & Suchitra J Y 2009 ‘Slow & Stunted: Plutonium Accounting & the Growth of Fast Breeder Reactors in India’, Energy Policy 37 (2009) 5028-5036

     34  Ibid

     35  Key Note Speech of Dr V K Saraswath, Special Advisor to the Minister of Defiance, Secretary to the Department of Defiance R & D at the inaugural session of the work shop on ‘India as New Nuclear Supplier’ organized jointly by CSIS, Washington and the Observer Research Foundation on 23-24 February 2012

     36  ORF-IEF Recom mendations Report based on Presentations made at 10th Petro India, Conference held on 12 December 2012 in new Delhi

     37  Report of the High Level Panel on Financial Position of Distribution Utilities, Government of India, December 2011.