The latest IESCO privatization news is that the Islamabad Electric Supply Company, a loss-making distributor in the first phase of the government's sell-off plan, has asked the regulator for a tariff increase of over 54 per cent for calendar year 2027. The company wants its consumer-end rate raised from Rs28.20 to Rs43.54 per kilowatt-hour (kWh), the unit used to bill electricity, starting in January. Its chief executive, Engineer Chaudhry Khalid Mahmood, disclosed the request at a public hearing of the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) on Thursday. The proposal is not yet approved and will be examined by NEPRA before any decision is made.
Why IESCO wants its balance sheet cleaned up
IESCO's management told NEPRA that the company made losses running into billions of rupees in 2025-26, and that it needs adjustments before it is offered to private buyers. The company's chief financial officer said the Privatisation Commission, which is overseeing the sale, had directed that the balance sheet be cleaned up first. To do this, IESCO has asked for a Prior Year Adjustment (PYA), an accounting step that settles past outstanding amounts, worth Rs157.864 billion.
The adjustment covers several outstanding items, including costs linked to supplying relatively cheap electricity to Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJ&K). The company said around 17 per cent of its electricity supply is tied to AJ&K territory, which adds to the financial load in its tariff petition. One intervener, Amir Sheikh, argued that any cost of supplying AJ&K should be met through a government subsidy rather than passed on to consumers through their tariffs.
Regulator questions on meters and the other two companies
NEPRA Member (Tariff and Finance) Amina Ahmed said she was surprised that the adjustment was proposed in one go, and said it should have been phased in rather than imposed as a single burden. Separately, NEPRA members questioned how IESCO has been installing Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), or smart meters, in parts of Rawalpindi and Islamabad. NEPRA Member (Technical) Engineer Maqsood Anwar Khan said the meters should first have gone into areas where electricity theft was more common. The CEO replied that the company started in urban areas because city consumers knew more about the different ways of stealing power.
The same hearing also examined the tariff petitions of Hyderabad Electric Supply Company (HESCO) and Sukkur Electric Power Company (SEPCO). An MQM provincial lawmaker, Sabir Hussain Qaimkhani, challenged HESCO's performance figures and urged NEPRA not to approve its revised assumptions, citing the lack of independent directors on its board. SEPCO faced sharper criticism: a company representative said its recovery rate, the share of billed amounts actually collected, was only 36 per cent in 2025-26, while a NEPRA member noted that Punjab-based companies recovered around 95 per cent.
What happens next
The proposed IESCO tariff and the assumptions the company wants for CY27 will now be scrutinised and decided by NEPRA. Until then, the figures remain requests rather than approved rates. Reports say the Privatisation Commission has received 10 expressions of interest for IESCO, but that figure is not confirmed in the hearing account.
Aasan alfaaz mein
IESCO, jo Islamabad aur Rawalpindi ke kuch hisson mein bijli taqseem karti hai, ne NEPRA se tariff Rs28.20 se barha kar Rs43.54 per unit karne ki darkhast di hai. Company privatisation se pehle apna hisaab saaf karna chahti hai, aur iske liye Rs157.864 billion ki adjustment maangi gayi hai. Abhi yeh sirf darkhast hai aur NEPRA ka faisla baqi hai. Agar yeh manzoor hoti hai to aam consumer ke bijli bill mein bara izafa ho sakta hai.
