Punjab Governor and UT Administrator Shivraj Patil on Monday directed the UT senior officials to expedite the work for the restructuring of the UT Electricity Department.
In a meeting with senior UT officials after a Public Hearing Session, Patil stressed on the need for corporatisation of the UT Electricity Department and directed the officials to speed up the work for proposed restructuring of the Department under ‘Re-structured Accelerated Power Development Programme’ of the Centre.
The project has been delayed for over a decade now. Recently, the Union Ministry of Power had also directed the UT Administration to speed up the proposed plans of modernisation of power sector in Union territory of Chandigarh.
To execute the proposed plan, the UT Electricity Department had hired a consultancy firm ‘Spanco’ in the year 2011 to prepare a detailed project report (DPR). But, due to delay in the implementation of the project, the UT had later ended its association with ‘Spanco’.
Now, the UT Administration has proposed to rope in National Informatics Center (NIC) here to undertake modernisation in the power sector.
As per the plan, major reform in the power sector by restructuring the Electricity Department into a corporate entity has been proposed. And, the Corporation will be able to appoint the employees as per their requirement and can take any decision immediately with the approval of the board of directors. At present, the Department is struggling due to staff shortage.
Under the plan, the UT Electricity Department also aims to turn around its ailing power sector in nearly eight months through all round power reforms including the introduction of Management Integrated System, Geographical Information system among other initiatives to boost e-governance in the working of the Department.
Under the modernisation project, computerisation of the Department would be done. Also, a round-the-clock call centre for consumer grievance redress would be set up.
At present, the Administration is struggling to cut down on its transmission and distribution (T&D) losses, which stands around 21 percent. As per the laid down guidelines, all the States and UTs have to bring down transmission and distribution loss to 15 per cent.
During the meeting, Patil also directed the UT officials to complete the construction work of slum rehabilitation projects in Dhanas at the earliest.