By IANS,
Chandigarh : Punjab’s council of ministers Thursday approved the restructuring of the Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB) as part of its power sector reforms even as nearly 70,000 electricity staff employees launched a two-day strike.
Allaying the fears of the striking employees that no privatization of the PSEB was taking place, the state government said that the restructuring would involve only corporatization of the PSEB.
The cabinet meeting, chaired by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, decided to go ahead with the unbundling of the PSEB and approved the formation of two separate corporations to take care of generation, distribution and transmission of power in the state.
There was tension in several parts of the state with heavy deployment of police and paramilitary personnel to ward off trouble from the agitating employees.
The administration also prohibited people from gathering in groups and carrying weapons in various parts of the state, including in and around PSEB offices and sub-stations.
Punjab chief secretary S.C. Aggarwal told reporters after the cabinet decision that the corporatization of the PSEB was taken in compliance with the requirements of the Central Electricity Act, 2003 to make it more efficient, accountable and responsive to consumer needs.
But the leaders of the striking employees said that they would study the restructuring of the PSEB but the strike would continue. Protests against corporatization continued in Patiala, 70 km from here, where the PSEB headquarters is located, and elsewhere in Punjab.
Aggarwal said that the restructuring of PSEB would now result in two separate companies — Punjab State Power Corporation Ltd. (Powercom) to manage generation and distribution and Punjab State Transmission Corporation Ltd. (Transco) to manage transmission functions.
Both these companies would be fully owned and managed by the state government, he added.
“An exercise of minimum restructuring had been done to meet the requirements of the act with the formation of Transco with a strength of 3,500 employees and Powercom having around 65,000. Restructuring of PSEB would not involve privatization in any manner as there would be no private shares in these companies,” Aggarwal maintained.
He added that top officials of both companies, including the chairman-cum-managing director and directors, would be appointed by the state government.
“The subsidy to farmers would not be affected in any way and not lead to higher electricity bills after the restructuring. Likewise, the power subsidy to BPL and SC families would also remain unaffected,” the chief secretary said.
He added that there would be no change in the service conditions of the employees as they would continue to get existing benefits including pension, gratuity, leave encashment, dearness allowance and annual increment. Moreover, there would also be no change in benefits to retired employees of the PSEB.
In another significant decision, the cabinet also approved the state government proposal to implement the ‘Punjab Prevention of Damage to Public and Private Property Ordinance-2010’.
The ordinance is aimed at providing severe punishment to people guilty of damaging public and private property during incidents of violent demonstration and agitations so that it is a deterrent for miscreants to participate in such agitations.
The ordinance states that those who cause damage to public and private property will be liable to pay for the damage and recoveries would be made from them.