Chief Minister Jayalalithaa on Wednesday constituted a 10-member high-level committee to review the power situation in the State on a weekly basis.
The same evening, the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Company (TANGEDCO) announced increased load shedding in Chennai city and suburbs from the existing one hour to two hours that will come into effect from Thursday.
After an elaborate review meeting of the power situation at the Secretariat, the Chief Minister set up the high level committee led by Electricity Minister Natham R. Viswanathan. The members are Municipal Administration Minister; Chief Secretary; MAWS secretary; principal secretaries of energy, home and finance; agricultural secretary, CM secretary – 2 and TNEB chairman.
The meeting discussed in detail the ways to mitigate power crisis in the State and on the possibility of early commission of power plants under construction. The committee will meet every Monday to review the power situation and submit a weekly report to Ms. Jayalalithaa.
According to TANGEDCO, the load shedding in Chennai and its suburbs was being increased as there was a vast variation in the duration of load shedding compared to other parts of the State. While Chennai and suburbs have only one hour load shedding till now, power cuts in the districts are of the order of 12 hours, say officials. As the gap between demand and supply has increased in the past few weeks, the company was being forced to increase duration of load shedding in the city and its suburbs.
