Kamaljit Singh*, Assistant Prof. Simmi Vashishtha, PhD**   79 LIQUIDITY INFUSION UNDER ATMANIRBHAR BHARAT SCHEME: A STRATEGY TO REVIVE INDIAN POWER DISCOMS* As a first tranche measure to fight the economic disruption of the lock-down and part of the strategy to revive India’s battered economy, a liquidity infusion for the power distribution companies was announced under the Atmanirbhar Bharat (self-reliant India) scheme. The present study aims to discuss the overdue, outstanding, and disputed amounts of the sixty-one power discoms from April 2020 to September 2020. The author pointed out that the amounts due by the discoms to generator companies have risen to Rs. 94,000 crores while the Indian government will provide only a total liquidity infusion of Rs. 90,000 crores for the needy electricity distribution companies. The payments owed by electricity utilities have risen to Rs. 1.24 lakh crore, which is more than 20 percent higher than for the same period last year. Subsequently, the debts of the discoms to generating companies are growing, making discoms unsustainable as unpaid power producers threaten to stop electricity supply to states. JEL: H74; M20; O21 Keywords: power distribution utilities; liquidity infusion; UDAY scheme; Atmanirbhar Bharat India will provide a cumulative liquidity injection of Rs. 90,000 Crores (on 13/05/2020, one crore was equal to $ 132,707) for indebted power distribution companies (discoms) as part of India’s strategy to rekindling India’s battered economy. Being implemented as a first tranche measure to tackle the economic disruption of the coronavirus lock-down as announced by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on May 13, 2020, this has exacerbated already precarious power debt financing (Singh, 2020; Singh and Vashishtha, 2020). These Rs. 90000 crores will help cover transparent unpaid dues claimed by state-owned financial institutions. The liquidity injection for the discoms will run like this. The Covid-19 outbreak and then the lock- down in March, April, and May enormously reduced demand for electricity (Senthilkumar et al., 2020). The decline in power usage has been so steep that power demand is projected to decrease by 1 percent for the entire year 2020-21, the first time in nearly 36 years. The State-owned Power Finance Corporation (PFC) and Rural Electrification Corporation (REC) will raise approximately Rs. 90,000 crores from the market to provide further liquidity to the discoms (Rout et al., 2021). The state governments will be acting as a guarantor. This one-time cash injection would be used to pay for electricity generation firms in the central public sector, transmission utilities, independent                                                             * University School of Management Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra, Haryana, India, kamaljitsehjanusm17@ kuk.ac.in ** University School of Management Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra, Haryana, India, simmivashishtha@ kuk.ac.in