NEW DELHI: With Chhattisgarh indefinitely suspending a Memorandum of Understanding with Delhi for setting up of a 2,000 MW power plant in that State, questions are now being asked if there is an attempt to stall power projects for Delhi to assist the private power companies in some way. Incidentally, the issue of four other proposed power plants being shelved for one reason or the other was recently again raised in the Delhi High Court.

In the petition, Vinod Kumar Jain, founder member of Tapas, had stated that when in 1998 he had filed a writ petition seeking details with regard to the estimated power needs of the city and the measures being taken to meet them, the Delhi Government had responded stating that it planned setting up a 421 MW Bawana Power Plant (Phase- I), Bawana Power Plant (Phase-II), Pragati Combined Cycle Project (gas based) and 300 MW coal-based project at Narela.

However, Mr Jain said, while Pragati-I Power Plant of 330 MW capacity was commissioned in 2002-03, all other power plants were scrapped. He wondered how Delhi Government intended to power the city whose demand has risen to 3,800 MW already and which would be needing about 6,000 MW of power by 2010. Ironically, in 1998 the Delhi Government's projection for power requirement in 2010 was only 3,600 MW, a figure that has already been surpassed in 2006.

Apprehending that the "respondent (Delhi Government) is still not serious in taking any decision for setting up new power plants and in having the transmission system modernised'', the petitioner has contended that due to the prevailing situation residents of Delhi have to face daily power cuts that cause harassment and result in economic loss.

While the developments on Chhattisgarh power plant have no relation with the court case, sources said there appears to be a deliberate design behind delaying or shelving the power projects. "Several private companies are going to come up with their own power projects soon and they have even kept aside some of their generation capacity for Delhi. The whole idea appears to be to create a situation where faced with a rising demand and no new power plant to draw supply from Delhi would be forced to buy power from these private producers at high rates.''

Incidentally, even in the case of the Chhattisgarh project the problem arose hours before the State Chief Minister Raman Singh was to fly to Delhi to sign the MoU with the Delhi Government. An official in Chhattisgarh later claimed that the MoU had been suspended due to unnecessarily meddling by the Centre in the issue. As per the pact, the Rs 10,000-crore plant was to come up on a 2,500-acre site in Janjgir district. Delhi Government had agreed to provide 30 per cent of the power to Chhattisgarh and another five per cent at less than Re.1 per unit. This has not only left open the question as to how Delhi will meet its power needs of the future, but also how it would showcase the Capital before the world during the Commonwealth Games 2010.

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