Chennai: Rubbishing the opposition allegation that Tamil Nadu is reeling under unscheduled and crippling power cuts, electricity minister P Thangamani on Wednesday said scientific and prudent administration combined with a transparent human resources management has completely eliminated power cuts in the state.
"We have made sure there are no power cuts anywhere in the state. There will be no power cuts in the future also. There has been minor power shortage for about half an hour in some places because of drop in wind energy generation", the minister told reporters at a press conference at the TNEB office here.
He said some power shortage had happened also due to the non-release of 4000 MW from the Central grid and the supply of 1000 MW from the Kudankulam atomic plant for the last three months. "Despite all this, we managed well because of the wind power generation. There has been some drop in recent days due to the reduced wind power generation", the minister said, adding that the repairs in two power generation units in north Chennai too contributed to the shortages.
He said there had not been any corruption in the import of coal, as alleged by the opposition. Claiming that the annual loss for the EB has now been brought down to Rs 3000 crore from the over Rs 12,000 crore seen in the DMK regime, he asked, "Does this not prove there is no corruption in our government?"
He alleged that corruption was high during the DMK government as heavy kickbacks were involved in the import of coal and purchase of power from other states.
Reacting to the minister's assertion, DMK leader and former minister E V Velu in a statement insisted that the people were suffering power cuts, particularly in rural areas. The audit report from the C&AG had reported losses amounting to over Rs.1599 had occurred during the AIADMK rule from October 2013 to February 2016. Senior lawyer Prashant Bhushan had filed a corruption case in Delhi High Court about this corruption in Tangedco, Velu said.
