Punjab Congress on Sunday termed the Talwandi Sabo Power Plant owned by Sterlite Energy limited (SEl) as ‘illegal’.
Party’s chief spokesperson and senior leader Sunil Kumar Jakhar said that once Congress is voted to power, the power purchase agreement (PPA) with SEl will be scrapped and money paid to the company would also be recovered apart from fixing the responsibility of bureaucrats and politicians, who awarded this project “illegally” to SEl.
He said that as per the Standard Bid Document for bidding, it was must for any bidder to have a minimum Free Cash Flow (FCF) from business operation of Rs20 lakh per megawatt (MW).
“The FCF from business operation of the Bidder should be calculated by subtracting from the average cash flow of last three years, one-eighth of the outstanding debt,” Jakhar said adding that contrary to these conditions, SEl’s FCF during last three years before bid was in negative, making the company not even eligible for making bid for the project.
“In 2006, SEl’s FCF was in negative of Rs24 lakh followed by Nil in 2007 and in 2008 also, its FCF was negative,” said Jakhar while quoting the statement of account SEl had submitted to the Stock Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in Mumbai.
“How can a company, which was not having any funds to operate the Thermal Power Plant, be allotted the projectIJ” Jakhar quipped adding that even instead of recovering legitimate penalty of Rs950 crore from SEl for delay in operating the plant, the state governing doled out thousands of crores to the company for not purchasing even single unit from the SEl.
“This all shows a multi-crore scam and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal owes an explanation why such illegalities were adopted to dole out such a huge amount to a company,” Jakhar said revealing that even for 2016-17, stated-owned Punjab State Power Corporation limited (PSPCl) has committed to give Rs1500 crore to SEl for not purchasing the power from it.
“Congress will scrap the project and recover the money given to power, so that the same could be used in other social welfare schemes, being promised by the party in its poll manifesto,” Jakhar said.