Chief Secretary directs TANGEDCO to resolve power cut issues in Chennai

CHENNAI: Chief Secretary Shiv Das Meena on Monday instructed TANGEDCO officials to rectify the issues that have been causing recurrent power outages in some localities in the city and take immediate action on consumer complaints.

After inspecting the TANGEDCO's round-the-clock call centre "Minnagam" at its headquarters on Anna Salai, he said that the utility has set up 60 flying squads comprising technicians to fix power failures in the Chennai region even at night hours.

"The call centre is manned by 65 people round-the-clock in three shifts to record consumer grievances of electricity consumers and alert the section office concerned. Two superintendent engineers monitor the call centre during each shift," the official said.

He added that the call centre staff follow up with the consumer till the grievance is addressed before closing the complaint and alerting the consumer about the same via SMS.

Out of the 23.97 lakh complaints received, action was taken on 23.93 lakh complaints which accounts for 99.82 per cent of the total complaints received, he stated.

The Chief Secretary's review has come at a time when farmer's associations and political parties are alleging restrictions in power supply to consumers in the agricultural sector.

The official told reporters that the TANGEDCO ensured uninterrupted power supply even when power demand had touched an all-time high of 20,840 MW on May 2.

"Apart from our generating stations, we also get power from the central grid and through power purchase agreements. Whenever there is a shortage, we also buy power from the market, to ensure 100 per cent power supply," he said, clarifying that there is no gap between the state power requirement and distribution.

"Uninterrupted and three-phase power supply is provided across the state. However, during the summer, when there are unexpected failures in the transmission and distribution networks, they are addressed immediately," the Chief Secretary stated.

The official also said that the recently-inaugurated Stage III of North Chennai Thermal Power Station (NCTPS) has stabilised at 400MW, which is 50% of its capacity, and added that wind power generation is expected to pick up later this month.