GUWAHATI, Feb 15 ? A staggering amount of Rs 850 crore due to the North Eastern Electric Power Corporation (NEEPCO) from the State Government is seriously affecting functioning of the Corporation which has been engaged in development of the power sector in the North-east since 1976.
Revealing this, the Confederation of NEEPCO Trade Unions, a united platform of all the registered trade unions within the Corporation, today said it was not at all happy with the State Government and the Assam State Electricity Board (ASEB), and appealed to the Government to ensure that NEEPCO got its dues. ?This huge due is retarding NEEPCO?s growth and project works?, union leader Pradeep Bhattacharyya told newsmen after the annual convention of the Confederation, here today.
It may be mentioned that the recent tripartite agreement between the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Union Power Ministry and the State Government following the Ahluwalia committee recommendations provided for a 60 per cent waive of the interest on dues as on September 2001 besides ?securitisation? of the rest 40 per cent. ?Although the waiver is not exactly what we wanted, we have to accept it because it is a Government decision. But the State Government even now has not shown any hurry to pay the dues?, he said.
Investment on infrastructure and security-related expenditure were also factors affecting NEEPCO as it makes the project cost to go up. ?Security-related expenditure has been quite burden some on us as several of our projects fall in insurgency-prone areas, but despite our repeated pleas, the Governments have not cared to bear these expenditure which ultimately causes the power cost to escalate?, Bhattacharyya said, adding that in some cases, as in the 1,500 MW Tipaimukh hydel project, even the project became non-viable for this reason. Bhattacharyya further said that taking the cue from Assam, other north-eastern States too were turning into defaulters and the aggregate due from all these States was around Rs 1,100 crore.