World Bank, in a study report has suggested that in order to enhance the competition and accountability in the energy sector, state power utilities and regulators should be 'freed' from political interference. It highlighted the need of state government to give greater operational autonomy to their power utilities and regulators, while holding them accountable for performance if the sector was to move to a higher level of service delivery.
The study, titled ‘'More Power to India: The Challenge of Distribution", which consisted a review of the country's power sector across key areas of access, utility performance and financial sustainability was conducted at the request of the Union Government. The report mainly pointed that despite the unbundling and corporatization of State Electricity Boards and the establishments of State Electricity Regulatory Commissions (SERCs) following the Electricity Act of 2003, a commercial operational culture had still not been achieved across a wide set of state utilities nor had the concomitant improvements in sector performance that were anticipated resulted.
World Bank in its report highlighted that lack of accountability; limited autonomy and constrained technical capacity had restricted the ability of the SERCs to create an independent, transparent and unbiased framework for the sector that balances consumer, investor and utility interests. Lastly, the study also suggested regulators to have enough professional staff, IT resources and greater transparency for improved public participation into the regulatory process.