Telugu Desam Party (TDP) national president N. Chandrababu Naidu urged Chief Secretary Sameer Sharma to initiate immediate measures to rescue industry, agriculture and service sectors by ensuring quality and uninterrupted power supply.
In an open letter to the Chief Secretary on Sunday, Mr. Naidu stressed the need for addressing the problems pertaining to power cuts to protect the people’s livelihood.
“It is the duty of government to give a first priority to the power sector because of its key role in industrial development and the State’s economy. But in the past three years, the power sector has been crushed due to the thoughtless policies and lack of planning by the State government,” said Mr. Naidu.
Referring to the period immediately after the State bifurcation in 2014, Mr. Naidu said the residual Andhra Pradesh had a power deficit of 22.5 million units.
“By implementing reforms and giving incentives, the State achieved surplus status by 2019. By this time, the installed capacity had increased from 9,529 MW to 19,160 MW. Thus, Andhra Pradesh became one of the three power surplus States in the country,” pointed out the former Chief Minister.
He said that the TDP regime had made plans for increasing power generation to meet the demand up to 2024. “However, but the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) government has failed to enhance production,” he alleged.
“We had announced not to increase power charges and ensured zero power cuts. At the same time, agreements were signed with the solar and wind energy companies for 25 years at the lowest purchase rates in the country,” said Mr. Naidu and urged the Chief Secretary to take necessary steps to save farmers and industries from the power crisis.
