Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Tuesday, Aug 24, 2004
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Tuesday, Aug 24, 2004 |
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Agri-Biz & Commodities
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Power AP committed to providing free power to farmers, says Rosaiah Our Bureau
Visakhapatnam , Aug. 23 THE State Government is committed to providing free power to the agricultural sector and there is no attempt to go back on the promise or dilute it in anyway, Mr K. Rosaiah, State Finance Minister, has said. Rebutting the criticism levelled by some Telugu Desam leaders over the issue, the Minister referred at a press meet here on Monday to the statement made in Hyderabad on Sunday by the Chief Minister that illegal farm power connections in the State, estimated at around 3.5 lakhs, would be removed. He clarified that it did not mean that no new connections would be given. "Free power supply does not mean unregulated power supply. We will give 50,000 new connections per annum. Farmers have to apply for the connections and get them in the proper manner. Otherwise, it will be a free-for-all and the entire system will collapse," he said. Mr Rosaiah said at present there were more than 23 lakh authorised power connections and in the last three months after the Congress assumed power more than 3 lakh unauthorised power connections had been added. "We have to remove those unauthorised connections. The whole system will break down if the load on transformers and the transmission lines increases so dramatically. The Chief Minister's comments should be read in that perspective and they should not be misinterpreted as the Telugu Desam leaders are doing," he said. To a question as to why his Government and his party had not foreseen the problem, and whether putting a ceiling on new farm power connections would not lead to corruption and malpractices, he asserted that his party had done its homework before the elections and made the promise in a very responsible manner. "Of course, free power means free power to the number of authorised, legal connections at that point of time. We do not, however, deny connections to those who are applying now. They will be granted after assessing the power situation, the groundwater availability in a particular area and the available infrastructure," he said. He defended the decision of the Andhra Pradesh Congress Party to give free power to the farm sector. "In the recent conference of the Chief Ministers in New Delhi, many of the participants opposed free power to the sector. In fact, there were even comments that Dr Rajasekhara Reddy had been isolated but we remain committed to our promise," he said. Explaining the rationale behind the decision and the promise, he said the Government which was spending crores of rupees on irrigation projects and supplying water to the farmers in the irrigated areas for a nominal water cess should not grudge free power supply to farmers in the uplands who were investing heavily in installing pumpsets and tapping groundwater. "We cannot discriminate between the two sets of farmers. Power has to be treated as an input and it has to be subsidised," he said. He said the Congress government would exercise fiscal discipline and "during the past three months we have managed to save Rs 181 crore by debt-swapping". He said the State had got Rs 280 crore extra after the recent budget announced by Mr Chidambaram and therefore the revenue deficit may be brought down to Rs 1,900 crore during the current financial year. On VAT, he said the State was ready for it, if the Centre was willing to make good the revenue loss. "Otherwise, there is no point in exhorting us to switch over to that system. It is the stand of most other States," he said.
More Stories on : Power | Andhra Pradesh
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