HYDERABAD: Union Minister G Kishan Reddy on Thursday said Telangana’s power sector was under tremendous financial strain, with generation and distribution companies carrying debts accumulated under both previous and present governments.
Addressing a press conference in New Delhi, Kishan said the Union government was ready to extend support to Telangana in power generation. He cited the state government’s White Paper on the sector, which acknowledged outstanding debt of over Rs 30,000 crore, and said the Telangana government also owed Rs 47,000 crore to Singareni Collieries Company Limited.
With electricity demand rising, the financial pressure on power utilities was increasing, he said, adding: “Even brief spells of rain or strong winds were leading to power disruptions in Hyderabad and other parts of the state.”
He urged the state government, which is inviting companies to invest, to prioritise power generation, saying industries would not invest without reliable electricity. He said the focus should be on improving generation capacity rather than creating new Discoms.
Calling electricity a basic necessity, Kishan said global power demand was rising and that 74% of electricity generation still depended on thermal sources. Recalling frequent power cuts in the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, he claimed protests over electricity were common before Narendra Modi became PM.
“Today, the country has round-the-clock power supply and is connected through the One Nation, One Grid system,” he claimed, adding that the Centre had provided new technologies to strengthen Telangana’s power cable network and extended assistance in multiple ways. He stated that the Centre had decided to generate 4,000 MW of power under NTPC and claimed that Singareni was in such a condition that it was unable to allocate funds under the DMF.
Meanwhile, Kishan termed Assembly Speaker G Prasad Kumar’s decision on the disqualification petitions against “defector” MLAs as “unfortunate” and urged him to reconsider it. He alleged that MLAs who switched parties had openly campaigned for the Congress during elections. He accused both the Congress and BRS of disrespecting the Constitution, saying that while the BRS earlier appointed defectors as ministers, the Congress was now behaving no differently.