Hyderabad: The Telangana state government has hinted that there will be no power outages or holidays for the agriculture and industrial sectors as it is buying 5 million units of power daily from the Southern Power Exchange to overcome the shortfall, which is around 800 MW.

“The shortfall may increase in the coming days and all efforts are being made to meet it,” Mr D. Prabhakara Rao, chairman of TSGenco and Transco, told Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao during the course of a meeting on the power situation on Thursday.

It will be a tough time from March first week to May second week, officers of the Telangana energy department admitted. The CM told the department to intensify efforts to procure power from the Eastern Grid i.e. from Kayamkulam in Kerala, according to a release by the government.
“Whatever the cost, agriculture and industry shall not be affected,” Mr Rao directed.

The officials were also of the opinion that with the daily monitoring and purchasing, there may not be any cuts for the two key sectors and the assured supply would continue. “With the short term and long term plans, we can improve the power situation substantially,” energy secretary Aravind Kumar told the CM.

The CM has already written to the Prime Minister and the Union power minister for supply from the Eastern Grid so that Telangana can see off the summer crisis, an officer said. The meeting also took stock of the solar power generation issue and Mr Rao asked officials to expedite the process of bids.