Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Monday assured farmers of eight hours of power supply every day for the ensuing paddy season, beginning June 13, while promising 24-hour supply of power to all other categories of consumers.At a meeting to review the preparations by Power Companies PSPCL & PSTCL for supply of power during summer and paddy season, the Chief Minister said his government was committed to the supply of quality power, in addition to 100% cost subsidy for agriculture and free power to various categories of consumers.The power companies briefed the Chief Minister about the arrangements made for meeting demand of 14,000 MW, even though the demand anticipated by Punjab State Power Corporation Limited was likely to be 13,500 MW.The Chief Minister directed PSPCL & PSTCL to ensure round-the-clock supply during summer and paddy season to all areas of the state.The officials of the power companies informed the meeting that good level of water in Dams would help in good hydro generation from PSPCL’s own Hydel Plants as well as that from BBMB.
Coal stock at all the thermals was sufficient i.e. for 32 days at Lehra Mohabbat, 48 days at Ropar, 25 days at Rajpura, 14 days at Talwandi & for 22 days at Goindwal Sahib. Moreover, arrangements had been made for 1000 MW from own Hydro, 1760 MW from own Thermal, 4580 MW from Central Sector including BBMB, 3370 MW from IPPs in Punjab , 800 MW from NRSE Sources and Banking arrangements up to 2570 MW for the paddy season, Captain Amarinder was informed.A spokesperson revealed that for FY 2018-19, subsidy of Rs. 8855 Crore was given for benefit of 34,52,600 consumers of Punjab, and for FY 2019-20 Rs. 9674 Crores subsidy would be given for 37,40,348 consumers. Two hundred Units per month of Power were being supplied free to SC, Non-SC BPL and BC Domestic Consumers totalling more than 21 lacs without any condition of consumption of number of units. Another 300 Units per month of Power were being supplied free to Freedom Fighters. Further, due to subsidy paid by Punjab Government, no payment was made by 14 lac Agriculture consumers on account of power consumption in the state.The Punjab Government was also subsidising power to 1,44,000 Industries, and about 1,05,000 Small Power (SP) consumers were being charged subsidised overall rate of Rs 4.99 per unit (i.e. no fixed charges). As many as 30,000 Medium and 9,000 Large Supply consumers were being charged at concessional Energy Charges of Rs. 5 per unit.