Aman Sood
Tribune News Service
Patiala, August 4
Without fixing the responsibility of the “erring” officers who allegedly “drafted and added lopsided terms” to the Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) with independent power producers (IPPs) during the previous SAD-BJP government, Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) has initiated steps to ascertain ways to revise/ cancel these PPAs.
The recent government directions only talk of cancelling “faulty” PPAs financially bleeding Punjab without fixing responsibility of officers who led to losses. Already many within the Congress have questioned the delay by their own government on “making public the White Paper on power sector”.
A senior official said rather than scrapping all PPAs, the government can revoke the ones causing maximum losses, but a set of officers “would not let that happen”. “Since the agreements were drafted and signed in favour of private firms, it will be tough to cancel those anytime soon. Rather, the government must act against officers who drafted such PPAs that ensured that Punjab continues to pay hundreds of crores without any guarantee of power even during peak season,” he added.
A Congress MLA, who was earlier vocal on power reforms, said the “same lobby of officers that was at the helm of affairs” during the last government, had blocked the “White Paper on power”. “Usually, the government suspends officers in scandals worth a few thousands or lakhs, but here we are talking about financial loss by hundreds of crores,” he added.
Experts claim the White Paper is necessary to bring to the fore the lopsided PPAs and “to fix responsibility” of those who led Punjab to a financial mess. Last year, the government had announced to come out with White Paper on power scenario but is yet to make it public, so experts suspect if the PPAs will ever be revoked.
Senior PSPCL officials had earlier this year justified that “IPPs are needed for the state”, in a reply to a letter by the Finance Department, which had flagged issues of fixed costs paid to private plants, power theft and higher tariff.
However, a former PSPCL chief engineer said: “PSPCL’s reply stating PPAs are a dire need lest Punjab shall be put into darkness citing insufficient available transmission capacity (ATC) was totally misleading as ATC enhances proportionally with outage of any plant/unit within the state pumping power at 400 KV. Recently, ATC had increased Punjab capacity from 6,800 MW to 7,300 MW with the same transmission infrastructure on outage of one unit of Talwandi supplying 600 MW.”
“Also, PSPCL got cheaper power from national exchange at the average rate of Rs 3.25 per unit during June/July against Rs 5 from private thermals,” he said, adding that Punjab can manage better with renegotiated PPAs and ensure that it gets cheaper power from the same IPPs when the demand is high.
On if PSPCL was working on revoking PPAs, PSPCL CMD A Venu Prasad said they were “already on the job”. “The issue of White Paper is with the government,” he said.
Cabinet Minister Sukhjinder Randhawa said the government should take action against officers responsible for the “faulty” PPAs. “We do not support such officers and it is high time the government holds them responsible,” he said.
Power bought at record low price
- PSPCL CMD A Venu Prasad said while availing the benefit of low prices at the power exchange, they purchased 302 MW at Rs2.22 per unit with a total quantity of 70.22 lakh units on Sunday
- He said the decision was taken following glitches at the Talwandi Sabo plant in Mansa. “It remained shut for three days in July and only two of its units are currently operational due to which there is huge power shortage,” he said
PSPCL misleading on capacity
PSPCL’s stance that without PPAs Punjab wouldn’t have sufficient available transmission capacity (ATC) is misleading. ATC enhances proportionally with outage of any plant/ unit pumping power at 400 KV. Recently, ATC had increased state capacity from 6,800 MW to 7,300 MW. — Ex-chief engineer, PSPCL
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