Jaya insulates schools from power cuts

CHENNAI: Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on Sunday announced that her government will foot the bill to ensure that schools across the State receive uninterrupted power. The announcement came a day ahead of the new load shedding schedule kicking in across Tamil Nadu.“To ensure students of classes X and XII, who are set to appear for their board examinations, are not affected in any way by the Electricity Board’s rollout of the new load shedding regime, steps will be taken to ensure schools receive uninterrupted power,” said Jayalalithaa in a press statement.“Wherever this is not possible, the Government will hire generators for use during the load shedding hours. The Government will bear all the expenses for diesel and other running costs,” Jayalalithaa added.While the government itself will hire the generators for its schools, government-aided and private schools would have to make their own arrangements to rent generators. The State government would reimburse them for the expenses incurred, the Chief Minister said in her statement.Jayalalithaa also launched a scathing attack on the DMK, blaming its regime for not doing enough to create power generation capacity. “Through the five-year rule of the DMK, power generation was increased by only 206 MW. The DMK regime failed to complete the implementation of steps and projects put in place by my previous government. Due to this, we are facing a power shortage. The DMK regime relied on buying power from other States,” said Jayalalithaa.She also said that congestion in the transmission grid was preventing the Government from buying more power from other States. Jayalalithaa pointed out that while Tamil Nadu had an agreement to get 500 MW of electricity from Gujarat, the grid congestion meant only 235 MW was reaching Tamil Nadu.Jayalalithaa also outlined the electricity deficit situation in the State. She said while 8,500 MW was available, the demand was between 11,500 and 12,500 MW, thus echoing a statement on the status from the Electricity Board on Saturday. She added that her government was taking all necessary steps to solve the power crisis.