CESC Limited and Tata Power will sign separate agreements with Jharkhand State Electricity Board (JSEB) on December 5 for taking over power supply to the state capital – Ranchi and the steel city – Jamshedpur.
The member (distribution) of the JSEB, C D Kumar told Business Standard on Saturday that the authorised signatories from the CESC and Tata Power would sign their agreements with the JSEB on behalf of their respective companies.
Kumar said that JSEB wanted the services of the CESC from the beginning of the coming new year on January 1. It was now up to the CESC to fix the date of commencement of operation in the state capital – Ranchi. The company (CESC) had to do lot of works before commencement of their services.
He said JSEB had selected two best companies (Tata Power and CEC) from the bidders. Tata Power had been doing their power distribution and allied works in Jamshedpur since long. CESC was new in power distribution system in Jharkhand and hence before commencement of their services in the state capital, CESC had to go through the documents relating to power consumers that was handed over to CEC in October this year.
Kumar said CESC would have to set up their office and employees in Ranchi. CESC would look after distribution, maintenance and billings.
Both JSEB and the consumers would be benefited from the services of the CESC, he added.
When contacted some consumers told Business Standard that they werefrustrated with the services of the JSEB for the last ten years.
Frequent changes of chairmen and board members had made a mess in thefunctioning. The consumers had seen fourteen chairmen mostly from bureaucrats since the constitution of the JSEB in 2001.The present chairman, S N Verma is the 15th chairman of the JSEB and he joined a year ago on deputation from Uttarakhand Vidyut Nigam Limited. After his joining consumers were receiving some services from the power board.