SHILLONG, March 9: Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma on Tuesday said the Meghalaya Energy Corporation Limited will have to pay Rs. 3,225 crore to the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) because of an agreement signed by the Congress-led Meghalaya Democratic Alliance (MDA) government in 2007.
The MDA had agreed to pay Rs. 133 crore annually for 25 years after the installation of the last unit of the NTPC’s plant in Assam’s Bongaigaon, he said.
“The last unit of the Bongaigaon thermal plant was installed in 2019. Since then, we are required to pay Rs 133 crore annually to the NTPC for nothing. It would mean that the MeECL would have to pay Rs 3,225 crore to the NTPC till the 25-year agreement expires in 2044,” Sangma told the Assembly while replying to the pending motion moved by Congress MLA from Rangsakona, Zenith M. Sangma.
“I am not here to blame anybody and I have not spoken about this ever before. I understand that governance is a continuing process and we take responsibility for the entire process. You cannot just put the blame on the present government when you realise that the whole genesis was during your time,” the Chief Minister said, referring to the opposition.
Sangma said that by invoking the clause of the agreement signed in 2007, the NTPC has basically crippled the Meghalaya government by neither allowing the supply of power from the integrated command centre nor allowing the state to purchase power from other generating companies.
“It is a very strange situation as we have not been taking power from NTPC since 2017. Yet, today, the NTPC could stop the Meghalaya government from taking power from other companies,” he stated.
He also said that based on the same agreement, Meghalaya has to purchase power at Rs 5.07 per unit from NTPC which is much higher than the prevailing market rate.
“Based on this same agreement, the Meghalaya government has to pay NTPC a fixed charge of Rs 11 crore every month even if we don’t purchase a single unit of power from them,” the Chief Minister said. “For the past three years, the Meghalaya government has had to pay over Rs 130 crore to the NTPC every year for not taking power from them. It is a very strange situation and a very strange kind of agreement,” he added.
He accused the NTPC of arm-twisting the state government and stopping the state from buying power from other generation companies just because of the agreement signed in 2007.
“It was the then Congress-led government that has put the present government and the people of the state in such a situation by signing a lopsided agreement where we don’t take power from NTPC and yet we have to pay Rs 11 crore monthly,” he said.
The state government, MeECL and the common consumers have to bear the brunt of the 2007 agreement, he added.
Revealing that discussions have been going on with the NTPC, the Chief Minister said: “We have been trying to explain to them (NTPC) that the agreement and the clauses which they are invoking are unreasonable.”
The NTPC has agreed that once the letter of credit is cleared the clause which prevents the state government from buying power from other generation companies will no longer apply, Sangma informed the House.
He also said that the Rural Electrification Corporation has released Rs 100 crore to the NTPC from the first installment of the first tranche of the Rs 1345-crore loan under the Atma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan scheme.
“The MeECL is now calculating how much will be paid to the NTPC from the second installment of the first tranche of the loan,” Sangma said.
Earlier, moving the pending motion, Zenith said that people of the state have been subjected to seven to nine hours of load-shedding. “This has created lots of problems for the citizens. The students are facing difficulties since they are having their examinations. Online classes are also affected since mobile towers are not functional during load-shedding. Bank transactions are affected in the rural areas and there are reports of a number of theft cases during the load-shedding,” he said.
The Congress MLA recalled the government’s February 16 announcement that there would be no more load-shedding.
“There was even an advertisement that the government had resolved the load-shedding problem within 48 hours. But why were power cuts re-imposed?” he asked.
Tynsong hopes for power self-sufficiency
Deputy Chief Minister Prestone Tynsong on Tuesday said that the power crisis in the state will not end until Meghalaya is able to generate enough power on its own.
Stating that the state cannot generate even 50% of its present requirement, he said: “With the Leshka project, we thought we would be able to get the expected supply of 120-150 MW of power but did not. We may get relief if we complete the Umiam thermal project.”
The Deputy CM admitted that the state was totally dependent on public undertakings such as NEEPCO, NTPC and Power Grid for electricity.
But he said the power scenario will improve.
“For the moment, we are in talks with the NTPC for sorting out the power outage situation as early as possible,” he said.