Court fixes dates for hearing of petitions against electricity tariff revision

The Supreme Court today (May 18) fixed dates for the hearing of the Fundamental Rights (FR) petitions filed by a group of individuals including Chairman of the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) Janaka Ratnayake seeking an order to annul the decision taken by the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) for the revision of domestic electricity tariff.

Accordingly, the relevant petitions have been ordered to be taken up for hearing on July 17, and 19, when the petitions were called before the Supreme Court judge bench consisting of justices Preethi Padman Surasena, Gamini Amarasekara and Arjuna Obeysekara today.

The petitions will be heard before a three-member judge bench comprising of justices Preethi Padman Surasena, Janak de Silva and Mahinda Samayawardhena.

The relevant FR petitions had been filed by six including the PUCSL Chief Janaka Ratnayake, the Federation of Electricity and Renewable Energy Consumers, its chairman and the members and Ven. Matara Ananda Sagara Thero.

A group of individuals including the PUCSL and its members, CEB, Lanka Electricity Company and the Attorney General have been named the respondents of the petitions.

However, the petitioners allege that the CEB has revised the electricity tariffs with no formal approval by the PUCSL.

The petitioning party, who points out that accordingly, the relevant electricity tariff revisions are unlawful, seeks an order to be issued for the annulment of that decision to revise the electricity tariff.