Dissipated energy: Indian electric power and the politics of blame

Abstract

This article presents the Indian electricity sector as a case study of the evasion of responsibility in public policy. India's electricity policy repeatedly fails to meet its own targets and is universally lambasted as inadequate. The state appears aware of many of the reasons for these failures, yet policies have consistently failed to make effective corrections. Part of the explanation for this institutional and policy stasis lies in the pervasive shirking of responsibility by actors throughout the electricity sector. The sector is analysed to explore the mechanisms through which responsibility is displaced, deflected or dissipated. These mechanisms include ‘agency’, ‘presentational’ and ‘policy’ strategies, which are both pre-emptively and reactively deployed. Using these strategies, responsibility is shifted through (1) institutional architecture which formally delegates power to other actors, especially exploiting the ambiguity in federalism, sectoralism, privatization and decentralization; (2) rhetorical displacement of blame onto other actors or ‘exogenous’ factors and (3) everyday policy procedures and bureaucratic practices designed to distance officials from decision making. By negating the requirement for institutional and analytical responsiveness, these evasions of responsibility perpetuate systemic failures and undermine the credibility of the Indian state.