Maharashtra committed to buying DPC power: Deshmukh

Maharashtra is committed to purchase power from the Enron-promoted Dabhol Power Company (DPC) once revived, chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh said today.

A senior secretariat official told Business Standard, "We had a fruitful meeting in New York recently where a possible resolution method was worked out. Now it is up to the Union government to accept the proposed revival plan. We are hopeful that the restarting operations of the DPC plant may commence within a span of three months."

If things go as per schedule, then the DPC plant can become fully operational, generating and distributing power within a year.

Deshmukh, while addressing mediapersons after the weekly meeting of his cabinet, said that the state government was committed to increasing power availability in the state which currently faces a shortage of 2,500 mw of power during peak demand period.

He said that while any new generation project would be a long term one, the state government was seeking its share of 500 mw from the Tarapur power project, which is pending Union government clearance.

"Similarly, the Parli and Paras power projects are expected to yield 250 mw each. If the DPC power plant also becomes functional in the short term, Maharashtra would be able to overcome power shortage and would not have to resort to load shedding of six-eight hours daily as being done today," Deshmukh said.

On the ongoing demolition drive launched against illegal slum dwellers as well as those structures erected by the affluent class, Deshmukh said that the state government would be employing the satellite imaging technology to ensure slum areas once cleared of illegal encroachments did not come up again.

"The civic officials from the concerned municipal wards, where the illegal structures are found to be coming up again after being cleared under the ongoing drive, will be held responsible and legally proceeded against. It is also true that while demolishing slums, we do not encounter much legal hurdle unlike the affluent defaulters who move courts to pre-empt civic demolition. However, we are clear that apart from pre-1995 slum pockets in Mumbai city, illegal structures would face the hammer under the civic demolition drive," Deshmukh said.