LAHORE: National Transmission and Despatch Company Limited (NTDC) expressed its disappointment and dismay at the imposition of fine amounting to Rs 10 million for alleged delay in completion of grids and transmission line projects, in a statement issued here on Saturday.
Declaring the Fine as being ill-conceived and excessive, NTDC spokesperson stated in response to the news report published in a section of the press, that the teams of NTDC are working day and night to complete the projects so as to eradicate the menace of load shedding from Pakistan. Delay(s) in execution and completion of the projects, if any, is not willful rather due to the circumstances which are beyond the reasonable control of NTDC like severe Right of Way problems (ROW), stay by the courts in different locations and poor law and order situation.
It is not out of place to state that under section 46 of the NEPRA Act 1997, the Authority has been given power to make Rules with the approval of federal government to carry out the purpose of the Act where through the NEPRA Fines Rules 2002 have been notified which authorises the authority to seek information, impose fines and penalties for failure to furnish such information.
It is vehemently pointed out that there is no provision under section 46 of the NEPRA Act which deals with the administration of the contracts placed by NTDC on various contractors or agencies for the execution of its projects. The fines which are authorised to be imposed under the Act, have been circumscribed under section 46(2)(m) of the Act, which only envisages the imposition of fines in case of failure of any licensee to provide information as required by the Authority.
The statement further read that there is hardly any provision in the Act which provide any authority to NEPRA to impose fine on the licensee in connection with the administration of its contracts placed on the various contractors for finalisation of its projects. NTDC feels that unfortunately, NEPRA has entered into an exercise of supervising the execution of contracts of the licensee which is totally against the Act and the Rules made thereunder. NTDC spokesperson stated that NTDC is considering assailing the Order of imposition of Rs 10 million fine.
Reflecting on the performance of NTDC, the spokesperson stated that NTDC has completed the construction and energised 500/ 220/132 KV grid station Rahim Yar Khan, 220 / 132 KV Grid Station Lal Sohanra in Southern Punjab, 500 kV New Lahore grid station in central Punjab and 220 kV grid station Mansehra in KPK in the current month along with the 145 km long 500 kV Double Circuit Neelum Jhelum Transmission line completed recently.
It is pertinent to mention here that besides a number of important transmission lines one specific issue as pointed out by NEPRA pertaining to 220 kV Uch-Sibbi transmission line, the law and order situation of Balochistan is a known fact, hence, the security issues resorted to its delay. However, 326 towers have been erected so far, out of 115 km, stringing work of 62 km has been completed and remaining is being done on war footing.
However, the grid stations at Chakdara, Mansehra and Noshehra were delayed due to the right of way problems, despite all the hurdles the grid station at Chakdara and DI Khan will be completed by April 2018. All critical transmission lines for evacuation of 1320 MW Port Qasim, 1230 MW Balloki Power Plant. 1223 MW Haveli Bahadur Shah Power Plant, 1180 MW Bhikki Power Plant and 1320 MW Sahiwal Coal-Fired Power Plant were completed timely and injected the generated power in the national grid. While talking about the CPEC projects based in Thar and Hub, the NTDC spokesman said that the construction work of transmission line is underway at last stage.
NTDC spokesperson pointed out that the Power Division Energy Minister Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari and Minister of State for Power Ch Abid Sher Ali congratulated NTDC and eulogised the efforts of NTDC engineers towards completing the ongoing projects, which is a proof of NTDC’s untiring commitment and efforts towards ridding the country of the ongoing plague of load-shedding. It goes without saying that this will support the government’s endeavour to mitigate the load shedding from the country.
