Power crisis: AP govt trips, sends SOS to Centre

DELHI DARBAR

Promise of free power may have, among other things, helped the Congress wrest power from the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) after a decade. But today, a power crisis that has led to blackouts in the agriculture sector and hit lakhs of households has Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Rajashekhara Reddy on his toes.

Reddy, who approved free power to farmers just after he was sworn in as chief minister in 2004, is finding it impossible to provide even seven hours of electricity supply to farmers. The Opposition parties, along with farmers, are up in arms against his government-agitating, attacking power sub-stations and gheraoing ministers.

The situation led Reddy to rush to Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde last week to seek additional power to meet the demand-supply gap of 1,200-1,500 Mw. He sought release of 500 Mw of unallocated power for the rabi season.

"As the state is reeling under a severe power crisis, we requested the power minister to understand the situation and provide us the unallocated power from the southern grid. Other southern states like Tamil Nadu and Karnataka have surplus power that can be transferred to our state," Reddy said.

The crisis is so acute that the government had to ban use of ACs and refrigerators in its offices and to switch off streetlights after 10 pm.

Reddy blamed his predecessor for the situation. "The earlier government went for only gas-based projects which are lying idle as there is no gas to run them," he said. The idle plants have a capacity of 2,000 Mw. He said the government planned to produce power from naphta, at a cost of Rs 1,150 crore.

"We even requested the minister to consider diversion of power from other grids," Reddy said. The state is expecting 800 Mw from this.

Two weeks earlier, the ministry had restored the state's 115 Mw share from the Kaiga atomic power plant after state Power Minister Mohammed Shabbir Ali visited Delhi.

The tripping of units at Simhadri, Ramagundam and Kottagudem power plants in the second week of December has worsened the situation.