Hyderabad: Former minister T. Harish Rao on Monday accused the Congress govt of pushing Telangana towards a severe power crisis due to its lack of foresight and failure in governance. He said farmers staged protests in front of electricity substations in 11 districts on Monday, expressing their anger over frequent power disruptions. Harish Rao said unscheduled unannounced power cuts had become a daily norm across the state, causing hardships to farmers, students, traders and people from all sections of society.“The crisis was entirely man-made and result of Congress govt’s failure to maintain adequate coal stocks for thermal power stations. The BRS had repeatedly warned the govt through presentations and supporting data, that thermal plants were facing a serious shortage of coal despite the govt’s claim that 40 lakh tonnes of coal were available,” Harish Rao said.Addressing a press conference at Telangana Bhavan on Thursday, the ex-minister said major thermal power stations, including Kothagudem, Kakatiya, Bhadradri and Yadadri, have coal reserves sufficient for only six to seven days. He said power generation had already stopped in Units 1 and 4 of the Yadadri Thermal Power Plant due to coal shortages, while generation at the Bhadradri Thermal Power Station had also been affected because of poor maintenance.Questioning the government’s handling of the power sector, Harish Rao said Telangana’s peak demand currently stood at around 15,000 MW, while the state had a thermal generation capacity of 7,180 MW. However, only 3,190 MW of thermal power was generated on the previous day, meaning that only 44 per cent of the available capacity was being utilised while 56 per cent remained idle.He alleged that the govt had failed in coal procurement, reservoir management and maintenance of thermal power stations despite repeated warnings about possible drought conditions. “Why advance planning had not been undertaken to ensure uninterrupted electricity generation,” he asked.Harish Rao further alleged that instead of fully utilising Telangana’s own thermal generation capacity, the government was purchasing nearly 80 million units of electricity from the Power Exchange at exorbitant prices. He asked why consumers, farmers and industries should bear the burden of expensive power purchases when sufficient generation capacity existed within the state.He also accused the govt of concealing facts by stopping the publication of production, coal supply and coal quality data on the Singareni Collieries Company Limited (SCCL) website. According to him, high-quality Singareni coal was being supplied to Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, while Telangana’s thermal stations were receiving inferior-quality coal. He alleged that nearly 30 out of every 70 railway rakes carrying coal were being rejected due to poor quality, adversely affecting thermal power generation.Harish Rao demanded that the government immediately restore full thermal power generation, ensure uninterrupted supply of quality coal to thermal stations, stop unnecessary purchase of expensive power from the Power Exchange, provide uninterrupted 24-hour quality electricity to farmers, improve drought preparedness by filling reservoirs and clear all pending Green Energy applications without delay.Former Ministers Satyavathi Rathod and Talasani Srinivas Yadav, Rajya Sabha MP Vaddiraju Ravichandra, MLA Chinta Prabhakar, and employees’ union leader Devi Prasad also attended the press conference.ends/
