Hyderabad: The state government ruled out any hike in power charges despite discoms facing heavy financial burden.
Energy minister G. Jagadish Reddy said power was being purchased through open tenders. Private firms were offering power at rates cheaper than government ones.
Mr Reddy said the government would continue the 24x7 free power to agriculture. It was spending more to purchase power from NTPC. “We are spending Rs 5.42 per unit to purchase power from NTPC Vellore and Rs 5.46 from NTPC Kudgi. Comp-ared to this, private firms are offering for lower prices,” he added.
NTPC Kayamkulam sought Rs 10 per unit and al-so wanted a three-month advance payment, unhea-rd of in recent times, wh-en private firms offered to sell it for just Rs 4.60 per unit. The government was trying to provide uninterrupted and quality power to all sectors and had been spending heavily to modernise the transmission and distribution network.
Water projects to be with locals bodies
Rural drinking water supply projects taken up by the rural water supply and sanitation (RWS&S) department and the public health and engineering depar-tment (PHED) have be-en moved to Telangana Drinking Water Supply Corporation (TDWSCL), which was established to implement Mission Bhagiratha.
The state government had earlier decided that the intra-village or intramunicipal works would be taken up by the respective local bodies with the technical assistance of the line departments. The engineer-in-chief of RWS&S had suggested to the state government to add two more objectives to the existing objectives of TDWSCL and amend the GO relating to drinking water project works in rural area.
