Haryana overdrawing power from grid due to Panchayat elections
27-May-2010 03
Vinod Kumar Gupta Font Size:
Chandigarh: Haryana is heavily overdrawing power from northern grid to keep the power cuts to minimum in the areas where elections to Panchayats are going to be held in first week of June.

People in parts of state have been spared long power cuts as first it was municipal elections and now Panchayats elections and the state power utility are over drawing 192 lakh units to keep the voters in good humor.

The power demand in the state has already crossed 1000 lakh units and power supply has been maintained at 952 lakh units and there is only power shortage of 50 lakh units. The state own thermal units are supplying 330 lakh units. The unit no. 4 of Panipat thermal plant was revived today after more than one month.

The 600 MW Khedar thermal plant is under shut down due to frequent boiler leakages and unit is still under trial run. The Government had claimed earlier that unit would be functional fully by middle of May. The Yamunanagar thermal unit is still operating at half load due to failure to control ash produced by unit.

In the neighboring Punjab the power supply is more than 1300 lakh units with shortage of over 106 lakh units. The power cuts in the cities are around 4 hours daily. The 250 MW Lehra Mohabatt thermal unit is still under breakdown since April 20 and is likely to be revived around start of Paddy season only.