Massive power outage expected in Meghalaya, NEEPCO stops electricity supply

Shillong: The Meghalaya is expected to face massive power outage from Saturday as Meghalaya Energy Corporation Ltd (MECL) failed to clear an outstanding amount of Rs 690 crore of NEEPCO.

A few sources from the headquarters of NEEPCO said that NEEPCO would stop supplying power to Meghalaya as they failed to guarantee payment security. Meghalaya buys 135 MW of power from NEEPCO.

Apart from NEEPCO, the government of Meghalaya is yet to clear all the outstanding payments of other major power generation organizations like NHPC, NTPC and ONGC Tripura Power Company. The peak load requirement of Meghalaya is 500 MW of power.

For the last few months, the government of Meghalaya has been paying in advance to NEEPCO for the supply of power. The sources said that as the Meghalaya government failed to make an advance payment, NEEPCO decided not to supply power.

The salaries of MECL were also not cleared by the government. It had been pending for the last two months. A series of protests were launched by the employees of MECL for the non-receipt of salaries. They finally resorted to a 'pen down' on December 15. They demanded the immediate release of their salaries.

At present, the future of the new power projects of the state is not certain as the government had to drop several hydropower projects. Two hydroelectric projects were also scrapped by the state.

The Meghalaya cabinet in approved the cancellation of an agreement with M/s Sew Energy Limited for the 65 MW Rangmaw hydro projects in November. The agreement was signed in 2010. An agreement, which was signed in 2007 with the M/s Jaiprakash Power Ventures Limited, was terminated by the MDA government on August 7, this year.

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