The 52-year-old Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) was re-organised on Monday with Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi formally launching the Tamil Nadu Transmission Corporation (TANTRANSCO).
As part of re-organising the monolithic Board, the government, in October 2008, decided to create the TNEB Ltd, the holding company, and two subsidiaries, TANTRANSCO and the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (TANGEDCO). In June this year, the TANTRANSCO was registered.
In September, the Board sent a proposal to the government on the organisational structure of the Board of Directors of the Transmission Corporation. On December 1, the registration of the holding company and the TANGEDCO was carried out. On Friday last, the State Energy department issued an order, approving the composition of the Board of Directors.
As per the latest government order, TNEB chief C.P. Singh is the chairman of the TANTRANSCO too. R. Murugan and S. Akshayakumar, Chief Engineers of Operations and Transmission, and S. Sekkizhar, Chief Financial Controller (Revenue) have been made the Managing Director and Directors (Transmission Projects) and (Finance) respectively. There are five ex-officio Directors, three of whom are the Secretaries of Finance, Energy and Industries departments and two are the Directors of Generation and Distribution of TANGEDCO. The Transmission Corporation’s Board includes Director (Operations) and Company Secretary.
TANTRANSCO would establish and operate the power system network of all transmission lines and sub stations of 66 kilo volt (KV) and above. Apart from planning and coordination activities on transmission, it would handle scheduling and load despatch functions.
The re-organisation of the Board became inevitable because of the Electricity Act, 2003. Since 2004, TNEB was getting extensions regularly from the Centre for continuance as the State Transmission Utility and Licencee. Last week, the Union government gave one more extension, this time for three more months.
Reiterating the government’s policy that the utilities would not be privatised, Mr. Karunanidhi told a gathering of senior government officers that TNEB employees and officials would be free to join any one of the companies. The existing benefits would continue.
The Chief Minister expressed the hope that the utilities would ensure speedy implementation of power projects and proper distribution of electricity.
Noting that the State had a consumer base of about 2.03 crore, he said the existing installed capacity was 10,214 megawatt (MW). After his government assumed charge in 2006, steps were initiated to increase the installed capacity to 15,152 MW. All the ongoing power generation projects would be completed by 2012 end.
A senior government official said that as soon as the proposal for the composition of the Board of Directors for the TANGEDCO was received, the government would give its nod. He hoped that the asset transfer scheme would be implemented without any hassles.
