Jayalalithaa writes to PM over Tamil Nadu power crisis

Drawing the Centre's attention to the acute power shortage in Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Wednesday asked it to reallocate to her state over 1,700 MW proposed to be surrendered by the Delhi government.

"The government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi has proposed to surrender power from various Central Generating Stations for the period from November 1, 2012 to March 31, 2013 for a quantum of 230 MW round-the-clock (00.00 to 24.00 hrs) and 1491 MW," she said.

In her letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, she said Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation Limited, which handles power generation and distribution in the state, had requested the power ministry to reallocate the entire quantum of surrendered power to Tamil Nadu and arrange to provide the necessary corridor on priority basis for availing it.

"I request your kind intervention to tide over this acute power crisis in Tamil Nadu," she said, while holding that the demand-supply gap stood at around 4000 MW, the "highest in the southern region".

This had led to widespread load shedding, "causing severe hardship to consumers," while the agriculture sector was also amongst the "worst hit" due to the failure of the monsoon and inadequate power supply, thereby affecting food production.

She recalled her earlier letters over the issue and the need to allocate additional 1000 MW power to partly mitigate the crisis.

"However, a meagre quantum of 100 MW alone was allocated to Tamil Nadu. Even out of this quantum, only about 78 MW is being made available to the state. The deficit situation in Tamil Nadu has been aggravated due to corridor congestion and I have repeatedly requested your urgent intervention to ensure that the required quantum of 1,000 MW of power transmission capacity is made available to enable Tamil Nadu to receive the power contracted by TANGEDCO," she said.