AIPEF seeks probe in power plant

YOGINDRA MOHAN
Patiala

All India Power Engineers Federation (AIPEF) has sought the intervention of Union Power Ministry in the alleged irregularities in the construction of cooling tower at Raghunathpur. Padamjit Singh, Chairman, AIPEF, has sent a letter to the Cabinet Secretary and the chairman of the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) besides the members of Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) seeking their intervention in the matter. AIPEF has pointed out that the alleged fraud in the construction of cooling tower at Raghunathpur thermal power station was detected way back in October last year. Since then, the construction work beyond 38th lift has stopped.

The engineers body has alleged that the extent of fraud was so enormous that has shaken the Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) administration. In February this year, a committee was constituted which gave the report in the third week of July this year, but no corrective measure has been taken by the administration. Padamjit Singh said that since the committee had concluded that due to the deployment of lesser quantity of steel reinforcement, the structure was unsafe, and that there was no remedial measure. “The logical step was obviously to take up the construction afresh,” said Singh. He said that while DVC was paralysed against taking action on the fraudulent construction agency, DVC could neither haul up the conniver Chief Engineer nor the defaulting construction agency.

Padamjit singh alleged: “It is learnt that DVC has constituted a contingency plan by which the cooling tower of Unit-II would be used to run Raghunathpur Unit-I. In that case, which agency is going to bear the extra expenditure of diverting the water of Unit-I to cooling tower of Unit-II? In case such stop-gap arrangement is used, then for Unit-II, there will be no cooling tower and this unit would get stranded.” He demanded that the Union Ministry of Power must look into the matter and a high level committee should be formed to look into the matter. “There is a serious lapse in this regard. The central ministry intervene so that the guilty is brought to book,” said Singh.