UP blames Centre for power crisis

Lucknow, May 7 (UNI) Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Limited (UPPCL) today blamed the Centre for the power crisis in the state and claimed the supply of power has decreased here from the last year's quota.

''The Centre has painted a wrong picture about UP, that it is violating the grid discipline whereas states like Rajasthan, Delhi, Haryana and Punjab are responsible for the problem,'' alleged UPPCL chairman Ashok Khurana here.

Addressing a press conference, Mr Khurana said the state was receiving about 11 million units short from the Central pool, which had led to severe shortage of power in the state resulting to law and order problem with people coming on the streets to protest.

Criticising the Centre for not giving proper share to the power shortage states from its unallocated share of 15 per cent, he said Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav had also written to the Centre on the ground they were providing its share to the states.

''It is unfortunate that UP is not considered for the unallocated share of the Centre while ignoring the huge population and shortage of power in the state,'' he said.

Claiming that it was surprising that Delhi, which itself was suffering from power shortage, was selling electricity to UP at higher rates from its Central unallocated share, the UPPCL chairman said. UP was alloted at least 3 million units less power this year as against 135 million units last year.

On shortage of 1667 MW of power in the state, Mr Khurana alleged the Centre had allotted only 191 MW, while Haryana was given 236 MW as against 583 MW and Delhi 300 MW as against the shortage of only 51 MW respectively.

Talking about yesterday's meeting with the Central Power Ministry over the grid discipline, Mr Khurana said in principle they had agreed to fix the maximum rate of power to be purchased by any state from others during the peak hours.

''They are likely to fix a rate of Rs 4.20 per unit for the purchase of power during the peak hours whereas at present it varies from Rs 5 to Rs 6 per unit,'' he said.

When asked whether uninterrupted supply of power to the VVIP districts such as Etawah, Manipur, Kanauj, Rampur and some others was one of the reason for imbalance in power supply to other parts of the state, he said these districts had less power demand than bigger districts, including Noida, Ghaziabad, Kanpur, Lucknow and Agra.

''In places like Noida, the per capita consumption of power is 1142 unit while in smaller places such as Deoria, it is only 72 units,'' he added.

While maintaining that by the first week of June about 400 MW would be added in the supply, Mr Khurana said by the end of this year, the UPPCL would be adding another 1300 MW after commissioning of power units at Paraciha, Vishnu Prayag, Harduagang and Tehri.

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