THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The second round of talks held by Electricity Minister K Krishnankutty with the three trade union leaders – Elamaram Kareem of CITU, Kanam Rajendran of AITUC and R Chandrasekharan of INTUC – on the smart meter project failed yet again.
The two-hour-long discussions held at Krishnankutty’s office saw the trade union leaders urging the minister to take up the alternative project instead of the Rs 8200 crore TOTEX (total cost of expenditure combining capital expenditure and operational expenditure) model smart meter project.
Last week, the minister had held talks with the trade union office-bearers of the KSEBL which also failed. Tuesday’s deliberation saw a healthy debate in favour and against the controversial project. While Krishnankutty and board officials stood firm in favour of the project, the union leaders urged them to cancel the tendering process. They complained that though the minister earlier promised to stall the tendering process, it has not been done.
The officials maintained that the state will lose the borrowing capacity and the 15% subsidy from the Rs 8200 crore smart meter project. However, the trade union leaders remained firm on their stand, citing that they will not entertain any reforms which would affect consumers.
“The ploy of the electricity ministry is to pawn the state by implementing the smart meter project which has not been implemented anywhere in the country. The stakeholders, including the LDF, the state government and the trade union leaders, were not taken into confidence before initiating the tendering process”, Chandrasekharan told TNIE.
The three trade union leaders stood for an alternative project – to implement the smart meter project with the help of the R&D institution, C-DAC, which has experience in developing smart meters. Else, they demanded the project be directly taken up by the KSEBL as they have more than 2,500 electrical engineers in its role. Later, Krishnankutty promised the trade union leaders that all the aspects they raised would be seriously considered.