Going back on his claims of Punjab becoming “power surplus State”, Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal on Thursday said that State is “capable of having surplus power”. He pointed at “out of control” things for the State’s power woes.
Making a statement on the State’s power scenario in the Punjab Assembly a day after Congress legislators staged walkout on the unavailability of power and water in the State, Sukhbir blamed it on the previous UPA Government at the Centre that “failed to create additional coal capacity resulting in under performance of State’s thermal plants”.
“We are in the capacity of power surplus state. But some things are out of our control. We have no control on poor monsoon, rains…..Similarly, coal is to be provided by the Centre,” he said.
“Congress-led UPA government's failure to create additional fuel capacity had led to under performance by thermal plants in the State that created the recent power shortage even though Punjab has achieved power surplus status in thermal capacity,” said Sukhbir while throwing light on the entire gamut of power operations in the state besides alleging discrimination against the State by the previous UPA Government.
“Despite repeated memorandums, meetings, pleas, and personal appeals by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, the UPA Government did not increase the coal supply to Punjab to cater to the new thermal capacity created in the State. As much as 1546 mega watt of thermal capacity has not been tapped due to paucity of coal,” said Sukhbir, adding that Goindwal thermal plant is lying idle since past two years of its completion.
Describing the current power shortage in the state as “temporary”, Sukhbir, who also holds the power portfolio, assured the House that power situation will normalise in the coming 15 days as the “new” NDA government at the Centre has “reacted immediately” on our request and increased coal supply to the State.
He said that the Coal Ministry had increased coal supply to the thermal plants in the State. “Coal Ministry has also agreed to give tapering coal supply to Talwandi Sabo plant which was in operational right now. These steps have already improved the power situation in the State,” he added.
Quoting figures, Sukhbir said that there was 5,700 MW gross installed capacity in 2002, which had been enhanced to 6,201 MW in 2007 against the power demand of 4936 MW and 8,672 MW respectively. “When the SAD-BJP took over in 2007, there was a gap of 2,471 MW between generation and consumption,” he pointed.