All political parties to be blamed for power crisis: R R Patil

Mumbai, Mar 17 (UNI) Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister R R Patil today lambasted his own government in the State for the present power crisis.

He said all political parties who had been ruling the State, including the present Congress-NCP government, were responsible for the looming power crisis in the State.

Replying to the discussion on Governor S M Krishna's address, Mr Patil said NCP President Sharad Pawar had warned against scrapping the Enron power project. But it was dumped and now it is being revived again, he said.

He admitted that in 2001, the Congress-NCP government had made a mistake when it filed an affidavit in court saying the State would not need more power and now the State was facing a power crunch of 5,500 MW during peak hours.

However, he claimed that the 7,126 villages in the State would receive single phase power supply by December this year. He also claimed that by next March' the State would have 1,528 MW power and a year later 1,328 MW.

Referring to suicides by farmers, Mr Patil said such incidents in a progressive State like Maharashtra were tragic and added that the State and Central government, in their relief package, had awarded Rs one lakh to the kin of 1,302 farmers who had committed suicide.

He said Rs 1,919 crore was given to 9.96 lakh farmers with bank accounts and another Rs 239 crore to 4.2 lakh farmers.

Talking about the debt the State government was facing, Mr Patil said the alliance government took a loan of Rs 22,800 at the rate of 17 per cent and the government further took a loan to repay the original debt. He said the debt was increased by Rs 94,000 crore during the Congress-NCP rule.

He stressed on the need for development of irrigation to reduce the woes of farmers and said the government would take more loan for the development. About Rs 16,000 crore would be spent on irrigation in the next three years, he said.

On the Maharashtra-Karnataka border dispute, he said only one page was devoted by the Maharashtra Governor on the issue while Karnataka dwelt on it in two pages.

He said even the Central government's affidavit did not favour the State.

He, however, said the State would fight over the case and provide justice to the people residing in the bordering areas.

UNI