Uttam describes Bhadradari plant as 'White Elephant'

Hyderabad, Nov 15 (INN): Telangana Congress on Tuesday said that the government had wasted precious time and money by opting for sub-critical technology to execute the 4x270 Bhadradri Thermal Power Plant of 1080 MW capacity in Manuguru.

Addressing a press conference along with the party leaders Bhatti Vikramarka, Ponguleti Sudhakar Reddy, G. Narayana, Niranjan, Arepalli Mohan and others at Gandhi Bhavan, the TPCC president N. Uttam Kumar Reddy slammed the TRS government saying that the government's lack of vision and awareness on the issues has put a burden of Rs. 1,000 crore on the state exchequer.

'Compared to super-criticial technology, sub-critical technology requires high usage of coal and cause more pollution. It also results in generation of power at higher cost. Although we pointed out this issue during discussion in the Assembly, Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao went ahead with the decision of using outdated technology,' he said.

The TPCC chief said that the government had opted for sub-critical technology to set up the power plant not knowing that it would not get environment clearance from the Green Tribunal. He said that the TRS Government went ahead with the sub-critical technology instead of super-critical technology despite knowing that it would not be beneficial to the state in many ways in the long run. The TRS government opted for the sub-critical method only to benefit some people, he said.

He said that the government's decision had resulted in monetary loss to the State and also wasted precious time.

The Congress leader lamented that the Centre's refusal to give clearance to the project may result in huge loss to the tune of Rs 1000 Crore. Even if the state gets clearance, the powered generated by the plant would be costlier than the power supplied by the Centre. BHEL was handed over the project by the government despite knowing that the company was using sub-critical technology for power generation.

Uttam Kumar Reddy said that various policies of the TRS government had put a huge burden on the state exchequer. He said that the TRS government had always claimed to be surplus revenues state but its mishandling has pushed the state into debt trap. He said that the state government was now claiming that it has no revenues to pay its employees, which shows the wrong priorities set by the TRS government in handling the state finances.

MLC Ponguleti Sudhakar Reddy said that the fate of Bhadradri project was hanging in balance and the future of employees working with the project will be bleak with the suspension of works of Bhadradri project. He said that the project now lies in uncertainty due to government's adamant attitude to go ahead with the old technology which resulted in the project not getting green clearance. He said that the Congress party would intensify protest against the government's ill conceived policies which is resulting in huge loss to the state.

TPCC working president Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka said that the state's mismanagement of finances has resulted in a huge loss to the state. The State which was surplus in revenues two years ago is now in debt trap, the congress leader said. He said that it was strange that the government failed to clear fee dues for students and did not waive off farm loans as promised during the elections. Despite having plenty of resources with TRS government when it came to power, the party failed to implement a single poll promise, he rued.