Slow growth in power sector is a concern: PM

New Delhi, May 28: With many states in the country facing peaking power shortages amounting to 25 per cent, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said warned that this could impede economic growth.

''The country's power sector did not look very promising. We are having an energy shortage of around ten per cent and a peaking shortage of over 13 per cent,'' he said, while inaugurating Conference of Chief Ministers on power-related issues.

There were states whose peaking shortages touch 25 per cent.

Shortages of this magnitude could be a serious impediment to economic activity, he said.

''The problem has been intensified by poor progress in addition to capacity generation, in cutting down losses and in reducing wasteful consumption. Further, the cost at which power was supplied was not on par with the cost in other countries.'' The centre and the states have an obligation to sit together and work out solutions to all problems in the power sector -- solutions for the short term and solutions for the medium term, the Prime Minister said.

''We need to collectively apply our minds to resolving the problems of this sector and resolving rapidly to make this sector a self-sustaining, fast growing one.'' Electricity is vital for sustained economic growth. If we expect the economy to keep growing at nine-ten per cent per annum, we need a commensurate growth in power supply, he said.

''After analysing areas which can be potential bottlenecks in our attempt to achieve rapid growth and eradicate poverty, one can easily identify availability of power as one of the key areas of concern,'' he added.

The Prime Minister pointed out that the country continued to suffer from high transmission and distribution (T&D) losses ranging between 30-45 per cent in many states. ''No meaningful development of power sector would be feasible with these levels of losses. A large proportion of these losses are due to theft. Theft is the cancer of the power sector. We need to come down on it heavily as it is seriously affecting the financial viability of the sector as a whole.'' Honest consumers who pay their electricity bills regularly bear the brunt of the cost of theft. Some states had shown determination for controlling theft and had achieved praiseworthy results. We need to launch a campaign against theft of electricity and get offenders punished, Dr Singh said.

''We need a focused effort to reduce T&D losses and bring them within reasonable limits in a short time frame. Along with theft control measures, we need to upgrade the transmission and distribution system in a time-bound manner.'' The centre would support the initiative through a revised Accelerated Power Development and Reforms Programme (APDRP) scheme through which it would reward performing states by converting loans to grants in an appropriate manner on achieving certain benchmarks, he said.

The Prime Minister also stressed on capacity addition and attracting private investment on a significant scale in the sector, besides rural electrification.

Inter-state transmission also need to be truly opened up to competition and a separate and independent government entity to control the National Load Despatch Centre should be established, he added.

UNI