Hyderabad: In another first in the country, Telangana began supplying 24×7 uninterrupted and quality power free of cost to the farm sector from Tuesday, the only State in the country to have achieved this feat.
Announcing this in the State Legislative Assembly, Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao said the 24 hour power supply would cover 23 lakh agriculture pump sets in the State on an experimental basis.
"Within a few days of the formation of the State, the government supplied nine hours of quality power to all the pump sets in the State. Subsequently, from July, 2017, 24 hours power supply was being given to the farmers of old Medak, Karimnagar and Nalgonda districts," Chandrashekhar Rao said.Stating that power utilities in the State will closely monitor the transmission and distribution networks for five to six days, the Chief Minister said agriculture pump sets in the State accounted for 25 per of the power consumption in the State.
Recalling that there was a maximum demand of 9,500 MW in the State recently, the Chief Minister said 198 million units of power was supplied without any interruption.
"I am happy to announce that the power corporations are ready to meet the demand of 11,000 MW following the 24 hours power supply to the agriculture sector during the Yasangi season," he said.
Pointing out that there was severe power crisis before the State was born in 2014, the Chief Minister said that due to the power cuts then, people faced untold problems.
"Official power cuts were implemented daily for two to four hours in Hyderabad, six hours in other cities and towns and nine hours in villages. There were two days of power holidays a week for industries, and due to shortage of power, industries were forced to shut down on a massive scale," he said. From a desperate situation then, the government has brought about a sea change in the power situation in the State now. "I am happy to announce that even as I am reading out this statement, the farmers of Telangana State are getting 24 hours power supply free of cost for their agriculture pump set," he said, adding that the priority given to the power sector, proper short-term and long-term planning and the efforts put in to pull the State out of the crisis had paid off. "The gloomy situation has been put behind and it is now a resplendent Telangana State," the Chief Minister said. Telangana today