Chandigarh to hand over assets of power dept to private firm by January 1

The UT Administration has also floated a tender to appoint an evaluator who will examine the PF and other dues of the incumbent employees of the power department. There are 1,100 employees in the power department, including outsourced employees.

Only on Monday, the apex court dismissed the plea of UT powermen against the Punjab and Haryana High Court order paving the way for privatisation of electricity in Chandigarh.

The Eminent Electricity Distribution Limited, the firm, has been issued the letter of intent and will be handed over the UT power department.

The firm gave the highest bid in the power privatisation project in 2021. Employees of the power department feel that they will be losing their jobs as the power would be privatised.

The Eminent Electricity Distribution Limited, a Kolkata-based company, had quoted Rs 871 crore against Rs 175 crore reserve price of the project. It is classified as a non-govt company and is registered at Registrar of Companies, Kolkata. Its parent company is the Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation, which is the Kolkata-based flagship company of the RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group, born from the erstwhile RPG Group, under the chairmanship of businessman Sanjiv Goenka.

A total of seven companies had come forward to bid in the race. At that time, these included Adani Transmission Limited, Tata Power, Torrent Power, Sterlite Power, renew Wind Energy, NESCl (NTPc) and Eminent Electricity Distribution Limited.

Will announce indefinite boycott: Powermen union

If the department is handed over to a private company without protecting the service conditions of the employees, then an indefinite period work boycott will be announced during the December 6 protest, said the UT Powermen Union.

Gearing up for the December 6 protest, rallies were held in different sub-divisions and divisions of electricity on the call of UT Powermen Union on Wednesday.

Addressing the meetings held in different offices, the union’s general secretary Gopal Dutt Joshi and others raised questions about the working style of Chandigarh Administration, especially the former Chief Engineer, and also criticised the then officials. They alleged that these officials showed haste while processing the tender and did not publish the transfer policy of the employees, which should have been done first and should have been notified after taking objections from the main stakeholders, employees and officers.

They stated that it is only after that the tender process should have been started, which was ignored and the tendering process was started directly, which was a blunder.