Odisha: Power engineers’ cadre restructuring by end of this year

BHUBANESWAR: With over 32 lakh households of Odisha still out of electricity coverage and the Aggregate Technical and Commercial (AT&C) loss beyond sustainable level, power engineers of the State have a challenging task, said Energy Secretary Hemant Sharma here on Sunday.

Addressing the annual function of the CESCO Engineers Service Association, CESU, Sharma exhorted power engineers to take up the challenge and finish the job by March 2019, the deadline set by the Centre for 24x7 electricity supply to all households.

Sharma, also chairman of all the four distribution companies,  said funds are no more a constraint for execution of infrastructure projects. The State Government, which had stopped funding to the power sector from 1995 to 2011, has provided more than `10,000 crore for capital expenditure in transmission and distribution sectors in the last five years. The huge infusion of capital is to reduce transmission and distribution loss and ensure supply of quality power to the consumers. It is now incumbent upon the power engineers to fulfil this objective of the Government, he added.

Emphasising on the need to invest more in human resources, Sharma said the State Government is in the process of restructuring cadres of power engineers which will be completed by end of this year. Stating that distribution companies play a very significant role in the power sector, Chief Executive Officer of CESU Md. Sadique Alam said the immediate area of concern is the high transmission and distribution (T&D) loss which is more than 37 per cent. One per cent loss reduction will save about `36 crore per annum, he informed.

“We have a very long way to go to achieve financial viability of the distribution utility. The task will be more challenging with addition of more consumers,” he said. To the demands of the association for implementation of 7th Pay Commission, time scale promotion, cadre restructuring and special incentives, the CEO of CESU said some of them can be solved immediately, while others need policy decision of the Government. President of the association Prasanna Pattanayak, general secretary Tanmay Mishra, chairman of All Odisha Power Engineers’ Federation, chairman of All India Power Engineers’ Federation Sailendra Dubey and representatives of power engineers from Jharkhand and Andhra Pradesh also spoke.