Three-day power strike begins over Telangana

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Hyderabad: Dark days are ahead, literally, with employees of the power utilities, APGenco, APTransco and the four distribution companies going on a three-day (72-hour) strike from September 11 midnight over the bifurcation issue.Of the 56,000 employees (including contract workers), at least two-thirds are expected to join the strike, badly affecting the power generation and supply chain in AP.While chairman and MD of AP-Transco Suresh Chanda appealed to the unions to reconsider their strike, the unions were in no mood to reconsider and declared a 72-hour strike (exempting emergency services), after day-long negotiations and appeals by officials, including CM N. Kiran Kumar Reddy.Chanda said APTransco will try to ensure power supply to essential services like drinking water, hospitals, street lighting and Railways to the extent possible.The state already lost 1,000 MW power on Wednesday due to flooding in the Rayalaseema Thermal Power Station. The strike, hence, may impact the southern grid. To prevent it, load relief will be the only option.Speaking on the steps it plans to take in the event of the three-day (72-hour) strike by power utilities from September 11 midnight over the state bifurcation issue, chairman and managing director of APTransco Suresh Chanda said, “The grid balance will have to be maintained by increasing load reliefs according to the generation.In case of a generating station even a small number of employees remaining off work can lead to the generation being stopped. Also, due to the strike, sub-stations as well as the entire transmission machinery will be hit. We will have to go on increasing load relief depending on the situation, to protect the grid.”APGenco chairman and MD K. Vijayananad, speaking at a press conference earlier in the day, said the strike will further worsen the current “hand to mouth” financial situation of the power utilities.“We appealed to the staff  to reconsider their decision and call off the strike,” he said. With the Rayalaseema Thermal Power Station units going off the grid, the situation was shaky on Tuesday morning itself. “The grid can be managed properly even with a loss of two to three thousand mw of energy, but we have to increase load relief for managing the grid further,” Mr Chanda said.When asked about alternative arrangements, he said that load relief is the only option apart from ensuring protection for workers who want to work on the strike days.