Karnataka 'saves Rs 500 cr' by giving power to Punjab

The Karnataka government has saved Rs 500 crore by transferring its power from the Kudgi plant to Punjab, Energy Minister V Sunil Kumar said Saturday.

“The energy department has succeeded in saving around Rs 500 crore of fixed tariff by transferring the power allocated to the state from Kudgi Power Plant to the state of Punjab,” Kumar said.

Kumar said the government had “foreseen the redundancy” of power allocated to the state from the Kudgi plant during the monsoon. “The energy department had sent a letter to the central government requesting to allow the state to exchange our share from Kudgi Power Plant with other states,” he said.

“Since the central government had accepted this request, the transfer of power has been successfully carried out for the past 20 days under the National Resources Exchange Agreement Policy,” Kumar said.

Taking a dig at the previous Congress government, Kumar said, “Since issues such as this one were not a priority for the previous government, the state had to unnecessarily bear the burden of Fixed Generation Tariff.”