VIJAYAWADA: Amid reports that foreign investors threatened to drag Andhra Pradesh to international arbitration for ‘cancelling’ renewable power purchase agreements (PPAs), key officials from the State energy department quashed the reports stating that no agreements were junked as claimed.
The government also maintained that it was proceeding as per the law and payments were being made to the generators as directed by the High Court.
“We have not scrapped any solar or wind PPAs so far. There was a move to renegotiate and review, but not terminate them. The review is being done as per the High Court’s order,” a senior official from APTRANSCO told TNIE.
On Wednesday, former Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu tweeted a news report which claimed that leading global financiers ‘warned’ the Centre, through Ministry of External Affairs, that AP may be dragged to international arbitration for cancelling clean energy projects. Naidu said, “Now, this is embarrassing. Never seen it happen before.
The MEA is now being threatened with global legal action, courtesy CM YS Jagan Mohan Reddy. I ardently hope that common sense prevails over retribution, which is hurting India and Andhra Pradesh to no end.”
Actor-turned-politician Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena too stated that Jagan’s governance was bringing disregard to the country. On the claims of international arbitration, the State officials maintained that most agreements were with domestic companies and hence there was no scope for the clause of international arbitration in the PPAs.