Not only that Nitish also urged the Centre to compensate Bihar in the event of the breakdown in the National Thermal Power Corporation’s (NTPC) units with which Bihar’s share was linked.

The state receives its share from NTPC’s plants. In case of technical snag in these units or accident of coal-laden train the state faces serious power problem as its own power plant in Kanti and Barauni are hardly producing any electricity. This happens quite frequently with the NTPC’s plant in Kahalgaon.
Kahalgaon Stage-I has four plants of 210MW each with 38.35 per cent share of the state in each of the plants.

It needs to be recalled that last month Nitish wrote a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, requesting him to allocate 50 per cent power to the state government from central generating power plants located in the state.

In past two months, the state has been receiving around 600-900MW of power against the allocation of 1,772MW owing to stalling of generation in one or the other NTPC’s units. The Farakka, Talcher and Kahalgaon units of NTPC have been frequently hit.

The poor power supply in the state is leading to acute water supply. It has seriously hit the industry as well as agriculture. Besides, Bihar has one of the highest transmission losses. It is about 42 per cent.
Nitish also urged the Union power minister for allocation of at least 1,500MW of power from Punatsangchu I & II plants (2500MW) in Bhutan to Bihar. As is known he visited Bhutan early this month.
Nitish also raised the issue of coal linkages for the power plants.

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