BANGALORE: Energy Minister D K Shivakumar on Monday handed over a cheque for `34.06 crore to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah as dividend for 2013-14 from Karnataka Power Corporation Limited (KPCL). The Chief Minister is also the chairman of the generation utility of KPCL.
According to officials, the amount was handed over as KPCL made a profit of `970 crore in the last financial year with the sale of 28,712 million units of power. When compared to the previous year, it recorded an increase of 4,330 million units sale. This is the 11th consecutive year that KPCL paid the dividend, officials said.
In the previous year, `31.27 crore dividend paid. KPCL is the only state-owned generator for Karnataka and has about 6,500 MW generation capacity. Nonetheless, the company had attracted criticism for low power generation owing to old infrastructure at some stations and frequent glitches with others.