AGARTALA, July 27 (TIWN): Tripura is currently suffering from acute power crisis with a daily deficit of 67 MW, official sources said. A highly placed source in the Tripura State Electricity Corporation Limited (TSECL) today said that the state is currently having an average daily requirement of power stands at 235 MW. The state is having 63 MW from own generation. The government is importing 105 MW from other states based on NE sharing agreements and power purchase agreements but a deficit of 67 MW still continues to persist, he added.

The TSECL CMD SK Roy recently admitted in the sidelines of a programme in the presence of Chief Minister Manik Sarkar that the corporation had expected power situation of the state to be better after the advent of Palatana project. “Things haven’t got any better”, he said. The source today said that though the government claimed to be running 90 minute powercut in the state to bridge the shortfall, actual powercuts are more than 2 hours in urban areas and over 3 hours in rural areas.

A recent exercise conducted by the Department of Power found that the spiking rise of power requirement in the state was mainly due to increase in livelihood status of people and higher use of electrical appliances that came with it. An official of the TSECL said later this evening that the state is currently drawing 82 MW on an average from the OTPC powered Palatana power project.

The Baramura project is generating barely 35 MW out of its installed capacity of 42 MW. Two out of four units at the Rukhiwa thermal power plant are currently out of order. The official said that ten more days would be needed to put things back as usual.