UP to invite bids for Bundelkhand plant after ousting NTPC

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) government of Uttar Pradesh (UP) has decided to set up a 2,000MW power plant at the same site from where it recently forced out another project that was to be developed by the Union government-owned NTPC Ltd.

Chief minister Mayawati’s government has floated tenders inviting bids to set up the plant at Bargad in Banda district, a top UP power sector official said. It will be awarded in two months.

Previously, power utility NTPC was to develop a plant at Bargad to provide power to Bundelkhand, a 70,000 sq. km region that sprawls over southwestern UP and northern Madhya Pradesh (MP).

But the project was shifted to Chhatarpur in MP after the BSP government imposed conditions on the sale of power it would generate, Mint reported on 1 April.

“We couldn’t cater to UP’s demands and hence decided to shift locations,” said an NTPC executive who did not want to be identified due to the sensitive nature of the issue.

But S.K. Agarwal, director of finance at Uttar Pradesh Power Corp. Ltd, justified the state’s conditions.

“We had earlier asked for 90% power from the project, which we later relaxed to 60% for our own needs as we are having a shortage of 2,000MW and are buying power at around Rs.7 per unit,” Agarwal said.

“Taking away a project from a state which is in need of power and would have helped in the development of a backward area like Bundelkhand is a bad political decision. It is not in the larger interest of the power-starved state of UP,” he added.

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