Sakal Times
Maharashtra electricity employees call off strike; Agree to 30% hike in salary
Wednesday, 22 July 2009
The employees had gone on an indefinite strike from Monday midnight. As a result there was no generation for over 18 hours. This resulted in a severe drop in generation by almost 6000 MW.
Even as the one lakh employees of the three power companies of the state utility Maharashtra State Electricity Board– Mahagenco, Mahatransco and Mahavaitaran – called off the strike, most parts of the state excluding Mumbai went without as more than 6000 MW of electricity was not generated on 21-07-2009. The employees had gone on an indefinite strike from Monday midnight. As a result there was no generation for over 18 hours. This resulted in a severe drop in generation by almost 6000 MW.

According to sources from the utility there were absolute power cuts in the rural parts of the state while partial outages were experienced by consumers from the urban and semi-urban areas including Mulund, Thane, Navi Mumbai, Kalwa, Shahapur, Karjat, Pune and many other places.

Representatives of 12 unions out of the 40 that had called on the strike met State Energy minister Sunil Tatkare at the utility's head office at Prakashgad in Bandra. In the discussions which lasted for almost four and half hours, the representatives of the unions pressed for 45% of hike in pay while the government stayed firm that it would not be able to give more than 22% hike.

After three rounds of discussions, the Tatkare finally agreed upon 30% hike in salaries of the employees which was also agreeable to the unions. “The management approved 18% hike whereas the employees wanted 60%. While the management agreed to increase it to 22%, union representatives agreed to come down to 45%. However, after the intervention of Tatkare the hike was approved at 30%,” said Sanjay Ghodke, a union member.

Since during the time when there was no generation, the state procured 700MW electricity from National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) in addition to the 2800MW which it usually draws daily.

“Despite additional procurement, state was reeling under severe shortage as the generation at Koradi, Kaparkheda and Parli had dropped to zero mega watt. Generation at the other stations was also affected,” said a source from MSEDCL.
According to sources, even if the employees called off the strike from Tuesday genereation could not be restored immediately. “It takes almost 10 to 12 hours for the power generation station to restart its operations. By 6am on Wednesday, the generation could probably commence,” they said.