The government is contemplating levying heavy penalties on states overdrawing electricity that results in grid failure and possible imprisonment of chief secretaries to check the menace. This was disclosed by Power Minister Veerapa Moily in an interview to a private news channel. 

Citing the report of the expert panel that probed the failure of grids, Mr Moily said not only overdrawal but overloading was also a reason for the collapse. He said there should be independent regulatory authorities at the state-level to check overdrawing by various states.

Over half of the country's population in 21 states went without electricity for several hours on July 31st and 1st August as three major transmission grids failed, bringing northern, eastern and north-eastern regions to a grinding halt.

Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde has asked State governments to proactively facilitate land procurement for power projects to help in meeting the capacity addition target of 88,000 MW over the next five years.
He said that the issues of fuel supply to plants and deteriorating financial health of state power distribution companies are roadblocks impeding the functioning of the power sector and need to be addressed urgently. He added, that the focus in the 12th Plan period has to be on increasing domestic coal production.

Shinde said that the problem of land is no less in the setting up of the transmission infrastructure, given the fact that in the current plan period there is a target of erecting some 37,800 MW of inter-regional transmission capacity.

Planning Commission Member (Energy) B K Chaturvedi said the major focus in the next five years would be on renewables. The share of renewables will increase to 30,000 MW in the 12th plan, from 14,000 MW in the 11th plan.

Shinde also pointed out that the single biggest threat to the viability and sustainability of the power sector is the deteriorating financial health of the distribution utilities in most states. He said that to make optimal use of the generation capacity involved there is a need to adopt a proactive approach in the procurement of electricity from gas-based generation plants to encourage the use of domestic gas and Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).

Meanwhile the Cabinet is likely to soon take up the proposal of restructuring about 2 lakh crore rupees debt of power distribution companies. As per the proposal, about 50 per cent of the debt would be converted into bonds, that will be issued by the state governments.

The elctricity will cost more to the consumers in the national capital as the Delhi Electricity Regulatory Commission- DERC has announced to increase the existing power tariff charges for the year 2012-13. The new rates will come into effect from 1st of next month. Briefing reporters , The DERC Chairman P.D Sudhakar said that the domestic tariff of electricity has been raised by 24.15 percent while the commercial tariff by 19.49 per cent and the industrial tariff will go up by nearly 20 percent in the city.

He said, however the average increase in all categories will be 20.87 per cent. DERC has also imposed a surcharge of 8 per cent on the approved tariff for the three power disribution companies namely BSES Rajdhani Power Limited , BSES Yamuna Power Limited and Tata Power Delhi Distribution Limited.

The Uttar Pradesh government has withdrew it’s day old decision to close shops and other commercial, business establishments by seven in the evening.

Quoting official sources AIR correspondent reports that the government has withdrawn its order with immediate effect and official spokes person has said that the shops and other commercial and business establishments will function as per their earlier schedule. The government had issued restriction on usage of electricity by commercial establishments in view of acute shortage of power in the state.

AIR correspondent reports that the government decision had invited sharp protest from all major political parties and business organisations.

An official spokesperson said that the demand of power in the state has increased to 12000 megawatt and only 10,000 Megawatt power is available. About five thousand five hundred megawatt is being import from central secto

In Madhya Pradesh, electricity has become dearer from today. The state power regulatory commission has increased the tariff by seven percent. Now domestic power consumers will have to pay four rupees 80 paisa per unit for consuming between 101 to 300 units.

Earlier they were paying four rupees 60 paisa per unit for consumption of up to 200 units. An Agriculture consumer will have to pay 20 paisa more for every unit for consumption of up to 300 units.

Growth in the country's eight core industries picked up to 6.8 per cent in February 2012, against 6.4 per cent growth in February last year, on account of healthy growth in coal, electricity and cement production.

The infrastructure industries had grown by just 0.5 per cent in January 2012. Electricity output grew 8 per cent, coal output surged 17.8 per cent, and cement output rose 10.8 per cent in February 2012, according to the provisional data released on Thursday.

Electricity production had grown by 7.2 per cent, and cement by 6.5 per cent, while coal output had contracted 5.8 per cent in February last year. Crude oil production grew 0.4 per cent in February 2012, against 12.2 per cent in February last year.

Petroleum refinery products output rose 6.2 per cent, against 3.2 per cent. But natural gas output contracted 7.6 per cent. Fertiliser production grew 4.1 per cent in February this year, against 4.8 per cent, and steel production increased 4.3 per cent, against 18.5 per cent.

Between April 2011 and February 2012, growth in the core industries slowed to 4.4 per cent, from 5.8 per cent in the same quarter last year.