LUDHIANA: A massive protest outside Ludhiana residence of Power Minister against the sale of properties of the power sector, against delay in 2x800 MW state sector thermal units, and against proposed Electricity Amendment Bill 2025 was held today by thousands of power employees, engineers, and pensioners from across the Punjab under the banner of Joint Action Committee.
Padamjit Singh Chief Patron All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) , Ajaypal Singh Atwal general Secretary PSEB Engineers Association and other leaders of Joint Action Committee addressed the gathering. They all stated that the Punjab government is planning to sell various lands owned by Powercom in different cities under the garb of monetization, which is a wrong decision. It may be mentioned that Punjab and Haryana High Court has also taken strict notice of this and the court has also restrained Powercom from taking any action in this regard till further orders.
It is worth mentioning here that the Rs. 159 crore Zero Mission Outage Project in Ludhiana city is facing hurdles from the very beginning, as there is a shortage of space for installing breakers at substations and laying new feeders
Padamjit Singh said that despite that the Central Government is reportedly bent upon to table anti-people Electricity Amendment Bill 2025 in the ongoing Budget Session of the parliament in a very chaotic manner, just to facilitate the corporates to take over of the power distribution sector. This will not only privatize the power distribution sector but also limit the role of state governments. Cross-subsidy will be done away and the state government will have to deposit the cost of power subsidy given to poor, low-income and farmers on an upfront basis. Private power companies will use the existing power infrastructure of Powercom without any investment and the prices of electricity will increase immensely.
The Central Government has already approved the setting up of two new 800 MW Supercritical Thermal Units at Ropar. However, the State Government has not taken any concrete steps for setting up these units till now. This work should be taken up on an immediate priority basis so that the dependence on power banking can be reduced and the State of Punjab can be made self-sufficient in the power sector.