Other States - Uttar Pradesh   

Mayawati blames UPA for U.P. power crisis

Lucknow: Accusing the Congress-led government at the Centre for existing power crisis in the State, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Thursday said the State was not getting its genuine share of electricity from the Central pool.

“The State is not getting its genuine share of power from the Central sector, as against total availability of 1,399 MW power in the Central pool, only 328.2 MW had been allocated to Uttar Pradesh, which is only 23 per cent. This has resulted in power crisis in the State,” Ms. Mayawati said during a high-level review meeting here.

The Chief Minister said that allocation of power should be done on the basis of population.

“Total population of Uttar Pradesh is around 16.6 crore, which is 54 per cent of the total population of northern States. Thus on the basis of the population at least 54 per cent quota should be allocated to the State,” she demanded.

Ms. Mayawati alleged that due to lower allocation, the State Government was being forced to purchase electricity at a rate of as high as Rs. 8 per unit.

“Despite having limited financial resources, the government is committed to ensure uninterrupted power supply to the people of the State,” she said.

The Chief Minister said that for integrated development of the State a special package of Rs 80,000 crore was demanded from the Central government.

“Provision of power reform was also made in the package. While Rs 2,938.24 crore was demanded for electrification of over 53,000 hamlets under the Rajiv Gandhi Rural Electrification Programme. It was requested that 80 per cent power generated by NTPC-owned Tanda power plant should be allocated to the State,” she said.

Ms. Mayawati alleged that not a single power project was set up by the previous government as a result of which power crisis took serious propositions.

“The existing government had taken some effective measures to solve the problem and by 2012 total power generation of the State will increase by 10,000 MW,” she said.

She directed the power department officials to ensure that people get uninterrupted power supply as per the roster during summers.

She directed that the stern action should be taken against those involved in power theft or consuming electricity in excess of their sanctioned load.

Ms. Mayawati said that with an objective to ensure better services to consumers it had been decided to introduce input based franchisee system for transmission and distribution work.

“Franchisee for Agra and Kanpur had already been selected,” she said. -- PTI

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Mayawati blames UPA for U.P. power crisis
RLD gets regional party status

Copyright © 2009, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu