The Uttar Pradesh government has once again criticised the centre for its discriminatory attitude as far as electricity was concerned. Speaking to the reporters here on Thursday, principal secretary to CM, Sailesh Krishna said that power for the state has decreased in the central projects.
The stipulated 37 % share from Singrauli has been reduced to 30% from the new units of Rihand and Unchahaar while in the Dadri project, it has been further reduced to 10%, he said. Also, the centre has decided to set up eight new ultra mega power projects to meet the shortage of power, but none of these projects would be set up in UP, he added.
Accusing the Centre of blatant discrimination, he said the state government had demanded 2500 mw from these projects but only 8% of the capacity of all the projects have been allocated for UP. The Centre, under the National Energy Policy, has fixed annual per capita consumption of power at 1,000 units by the year 2012. If UP’s per capita consumption of the energy, which is 300 units per year, had to be brought at par with that of the Centre, special arrangements for the state are needed.
Reiterating the fact that the state government had already issued strong directives to concerning officers for ensuring the safety of grid. Singh said if we look at the situation of over drawl in the month of November, Uttar Pradesh had made only 12% over drawl, while Haryana, Punjab and Uttarakhand had made 16, 18 and 28% over drawl respectively. “Uttar Pradesh had not made any over drawl in December”, he added.
Stating that Uttar Pradesh has accorded top most priority to the energy sector, Singh said, the government has taken several steps for energy reforms and the Centre’s cooperation is needed for it to carry them forward. During the 11th Five Year Plan, the state government has set about with the objective of generating 10,000 mw of electricity