SHILLONG, APR 29: Power Minister AT Mondal on Monday said the state has not gone for any loadshedding as of now and the power department is working to see as far as possible they will not go for loadshedding.
Aiming to provide an uninterrupted power supply as mandate from the Chief Minister, the Power Minister said like last year the rainfall is delayed in the state. However, there are shut down because of maintenance work, he admitted.
Talking to mediapersons, Mondal said “As of now, we have not gone for any load shedding and we are working to see that as far as possible we will not go for loadshedding.”
The Minister said that the MeECL has been able to provide uninterrupted power supply during the board examinations as well as during the just concluded Lok Sabha elections in the state.
“We are happy to say that we have done that by ensuring there was no loadshedding,” Mondal said. He said, “Now, we are trying our level best to see that we don’t go for any load shedding.”
He said that the state totally relies on hydro power projects for supply of electricity. “Such projects depend on rainfall and this year also like last year, rain is a little bit delayed and we are just hoping that it should land in Meghalaya maybe in the next couple of weeks and if that is the case then hopefully we will not go for any load shedding.”
“The mandate from the chief minister is that we have to provide uninterrupted power supply. We are working on that line and let us hope we achieve that,” he added.
Last year, the state had witnessed long hours of loadshedding of which 7 hours in urban areas and almost 9 hours in rural areas. “This year, till now we have not gone for any such scheduled load shedding,” Mondal said.
Asked, Mondal said, “The shutdown happens due to various reasons and these reasons are may be conductor snapping, may be lightening, may be transformer burning, trees falling on the live wires and all these things then our people take shutdown to repair sub stations, to repair transformers, repairs the lines and all.”