Over 15,000 MW gas-based capacity is stranded in the country due to non supply of natural gas from Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries (RIL) KG basin.

“The total capacity of gas-based stations in India is 18,830 MW of which 15,529 MW is fed with gas from RIL. That (15,529 MW) is idle as there is no gas available from RIL, ” an official said.

The gas-based capacity which is lying idle due to want of fuel comprises central, state as well as private power plants.

Six of NTPC’s seven gas-based power plants have zero gas available with them. The country‘s largest power producer’s total gas-based capacity stands at 3,955 MW of which 3,605 MW is stranded due to lack of fuel, he said.

As many as 37 power stations in the country, which have tied up 33 MMSCMD (million standard cubic metres per day) gas from RIL‘s KG basin have nil fuel at their disposal, the official added.

The are 55 gas-based stations — 14 (Andhra Pradesh), 12 (Gujarat), 6 (Tamil Nadu), 5 (Assam), 4 each in Delhi and Tripura, 3 each in Rajasthan and Maharashtra, 2 (Uttar Pradesh) and one each in Haryana and Puducherry.

All the 4 power gas-based power stations in capital Delhi are not receiving gas from RIL. As many as 10 power stations in Gujarat, 7 in Andhra Pradesh are also stranded for the same reason, the official said.

Private power generation company GMR Energy’s 220 MW plant at Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh has also not received supply from RIL, he said.

The beleaguered Ratnagiri project in Maharashtra with a capacity of 2,220 MW did not receive any natural gas from KG Basin, he added.

The supplies from KG-D6 block to power plants were snapped in March this year after output from the eastern offshore fields dropped to an all-time low.

]]> http://canindia.com/2013/05/zero-supply-from-reliance-industries-15000-mw-capacity-plants-stuck/feed/ 0 http://canindia.com/2013/05/we-were-in-a-relationship-phaneesh-murthy/ http://canindia.com/2013/05/we-were-in-a-relationship-phaneesh-murthy/#comments Tue, 21 May 2013 11:25:03 +0000 Web Editor http://canindia.com/?p=94860 BANGALORE

A day after being sacked from his position as iGate CEO, Phaneesh Murthy claimed on Tuesday that he was a victim of “extortion” by an employee who has filed a sexual harassment case against him. Participating in a 30-minute telephonic media conference from Fremont, California, Mr. Murthy denied he had violated company policy by not disclosing his relationship with his colleague.

Mr. Murthy said he had informed the iGate Chairman of his relationship “many weeks ago.” He admitted that he took this step after his relationship with the colleague, which lasted for a few months, “was over.” However, Mr. Murthy refused to confirm whether he had conveyed to the Chairman the nature of his relationship in writing or verbally.

On the nature of complaint filed by his colleague “late last week,” Mr. Murthy said, he had “not been motivated to see the letter.” Adding that she did not report to him, but to the Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Murthy claimed that the complaint had not been filed in court. “I will fight it vigorously if it comes to a court of law,” he said.

Mr. Murthy referred to company rules that stipulate disclosures of “relationships” between employees as “a small note in the employee handbook in the company.” The company had earlier stated that his failure to disclose his relationship “violated” company policy and his employment contract.

However, it stated that its investigation had not “uncovered any violation of iGate’s harassment policy.” Mr. Murthy denied he had violated company policy in any way and said he reserved “all options” after consultations with his legal team. “I was not given an opportunity to present my views to the board,” he claimed. “I have not decided whether to fight my dismissal.”

Extortion

Mr. Murthy alleged that the same legal firm and lawyer who fought on behalf of the sexual harassment complainant in the Infosys case a decade ago had filed this complaint. “It is without doubt a case of extortion because it is a very easy way to collect money after the first case,” he contended.

Referring to his plight, Mr. Murthy said, “It is about as negative as it gets.” And, responding in a more provocative vein to reporter’s query about how things came to such a pass, he said: “If you can figure out women, let me know.”

Vindu Dara Singh, son of late actor Dara Singh, was arrested in Mumbai on Tuesday for his alleged role in the ongoing spot fixing saga.

According to various media reports, Vindu has apparently accepted being involved in betting.

It is the first Bollywood link that has been revealed.

It has been learned that Vindu acted as a middle-man between bookie Vyas and the cricketers. He used to hang out with cricketers and extracted information.

Vindu Dara Singh, 49, has acted in some movies and serials. He won the third season of Bigg Boss in 2009.

Earlier in the day, former Ranji player Baburao Yadav was arrested in connection with the IPL spot-fixing scandal even as police said it is likely to seek further custody of three arrested players and some bookies.

Yadav, who was picked up from Delhi yesterday and questioned for his links with arrested player Ajit Chandila, has been placed under arrest, police sources said.

It was Yadav who allegedly introduced Chandila to bookie Sunil Bhatia, who is already arrested, they said.

With his arrest, a total of 18 people — three IPL players, four former players and 11 bookies and their assistants — have been arrested since last Thursday in connection with the scandal that rocked the cricketing world.

Police sources also said they will seek custody of three arrested players — Sreesanth, Chandila and Ankit Chavan — and 8 bookies when they will be produced in court as their remand ends today.

Rajasthan Royals had yesterday lodged a complaint with Delhi Police against its three players — Chandila, Sreesanth and Ankit Chavan — accusing them of cheating and other charges.

Two persons, who watched the Rajasthan Royals matches in Chandigarh and Mumbai, had also approached police with complaints of cheating.

BCCI`s anti-corruption unit chief Ravi Sawani, who has been asked to head the probe in spot-fixing by the cricketing body, yesterday held a meeting with Delhi Police Commissioner Neeraj Kumar and other top officials and offered all help.

Investigators yesterday took Chandila to his aunt`s house in Palwal in Haryana from where they allegedly recovered Rs 20 lakh from a cricket kit which also contained his personal belongings, the official said.

Meanwhile in an another important development, the Supreme Court today rejected a PIL seeking stay on all remaining matches of IPL in view of the spot-fixing scandal.

The Supreme Court, however, has asked the anti-corruption unit of BCCI to submit its report on this matter within 15 days.

A bench of justices B S Chauhan and Deepak Misra rejected the PIL which also sought setting up of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to look into the issues of match fixing and other alleged irregularities in the IPL.

Two microscope slides bearing the blood of former Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi are to go on sale in London on Tuesday and are expected to fetch from 10,000 pounds to 15,000 pounds.

The slides were obtained in 1924 when the father of the Indian independence movement was recovering from an appendectomy near Mumbai. He was thought to have donated the blood to the family he was staying with at the time.

“To Gandhi devotees, it has the same status as a sacred relic to a Christian,” said Richard Westwood-Brookes, a historical documents expert at Mullock’s auctioneers which is selling the item.

“It is an artefact which is revered by disciples of Gandhi, particularly in India and therefore that is the sort of person who would go for it,” he added.

The slides are part of a larger collection of items obtained by Mullock’s, which include the former leader’s sandals, shawl and bed linen.

Demand for Gandhi memorabilia has been steadily growing since Mullock’s sold soil samples and blades of bloody grass purportedly from the spot where Gandhi was assassinated in 1948, for 10,000 pounds last year.

CAG Vinod Rai today attacked former lead auditor R P Singh for disowning the report on 2G spectrum allocation on “afterthought” and observed that loyalty to profession should be maintained even after retirement.

“There is a certain professional integrity that all of us must have. So, when we are on our jobs, it is not fair for us to fulfil our professional duties and then as an afterthought post-retirement repudiate all that and go back on it,” Rai told PTI in an interview.

The outgoing CAG was asked to comment on R P Singh, former Director General Audit, disowning the CAG report on spectrum allocation after retirement, and claiming he had been forced to sign the controversial report which pegged the loss at Rs 1.76 lakh crore.

“It (disowning report) is not a fair thing to do because each one of us should not have personal loyalty, which means person-to-person loyalty. Our loyalty should be to our profession. That is where I think professional integrity is of great importance,” Rai said.

Everyone needs to be “truly faithful” to his or her profession, he added.

He insisted that the audit reports are collective effort and the system is so robust that no one, even the CAG, can influence them.

“This particular report on the spectrum also underwent a peer-review where the same DG made a presentation to his peers who went through the report to ensure that it is objective, well balanced and does not have any nuance which is not factually not borne out,” Rai noted.

The CAG report, tabled in Parliament in November 2010, had raised a political storm that led to sacking of Telecommunications minister A Raja and setting up of a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) to probe the issue.

The controversy over 2G spectrum allocation also led to cancellation to 122 licences by the Supreme Court.

Normal life was paralysed in the municipal corporation area here on Tuesday in response to a dawn-to-dusk bandh called by opposition Congress to protest the killing of three employees of ‘Dainik Ganadoot’, a local Bengali daily.

Vehicles remained off the roads and markets, schools, colleges and educational institutions were closed. Official sources said attendance in government offices, banks and financial institutions was also thin.

Police said no untoward incident was reported from any part of the city. Motorcycle-borne miscreants attacked the newspaper office at the Palace Compound on Sunday and stabbed to death the office manager, a proof reader and a driver.

Leader of the Opposition Ratan Lal Nath, belonging to the Congress, said that the killing proved that journalists and newspaper employees were not safe in the state.

Vijay Singh, a head constable in Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), on Monday night fired at his colleagues, killing two of them and injuring two others, sources said.

He was soon overpowered and put under arrest.

A resident of Una, Himachal Pradesh, Vijay Singh fired on his colleagues at around 12:30 am, official sources said.

SSB officials are interrogating Vijay Singh to determine the reasons behind this incident.

Five migrant labourers were shot dead and few others were injured when suspected tribal militants indiscriminately fired upon them in a mining village in Meghalaya’s South Garo Hills district, police said on Tuesday.

Suspected militants from the United Achik Liberation Army (UALA), a breakaway faction of the Achik National Volunteer Council-B faction, led by Norrok Momin went to the mining camp at Darangdura village last evening and fired at the labourers, the police said.

The gunmen came to the quarry and pushed the labourers to one corner before opening fire on them from their automatic rifles resulting in the death of five workers and injury to others, the police added.

Cops suspected that the shooting was a result of non-payment of extortion by the mine owner.

The village is situated in an extremely remote area of the state and is full of coal mines. Those killed belong to the Goalpara district of Assam. Post-mortem is being conducted after which the bodies of the labourers will be handed over to their relatives.

The police have intensified vigil in and around the camp area and launched a manhunt to nab those involved in the criminal act, district police chief Davis Nestell R Marak said.

Several militant outfits have mushroomed in five districts of Garo Hills affecting the law and order situation.

Union Minister Manish Tewari on Monday took pot shots at CAG Vinod Rai asking why Rs1.78 lakh crore was not generated in the 2G auction and invited him to a public debate to discuss the loss estimated by the auditor.

“The report had said that if an auction is held, it would yield a revenue to the tune of Rs1 lakh 76 thousand crore. The fact is that an auction was held. But where is that 1 lakh 76 thousand crore?” Tewari said.

“Now that the CAG is retiring, he is giving full fledged interviews, he’ll have time on his hands. So all I am requesting is that at a time and place of his choosing, he can even do it a month or two later — once he settles down after retirement, lets have a full fledged public debate on his 2G report and let the people judge for themselves,” he told reporters at the sidelines of an event here organised by Observer Research Foundation.

The minister said there was a debate which played out in the Joint Parliamentary Committee on 2G spectrum, but he was bound by privilege not to reveal the contents of that debate.

“I think he (Rai) also respects the parliamentary traditions, but there is no point in both of us or the government or the CAG trying to put its views separately in the public space. Let there be public debate and let the people be the final arbiters as to whether the facts as they were stated were correct or incorrect,” Tewari further said.

Rai, who is set to retire on May 22, in a media report said that he “felt sorry” for Kapil Sibal and other ministers who sought to dismiss the 2G report by proffering a “zero-loss” theory.

Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai, who demits office on Wednesday, will be remembered for turning the statutory body into a pugnacious watchdog of good governance and administrative integrity at a time when India is experiencing the need for greater transparency and a rebalancing of power that has tilted over the years towards the executive.

Rai’s five-year tenure (2008-2013) has been a tad controversial because of the unprecedented public profile the CAG‘s office – which the average Indian knew little about previously – acquired and the political storms it generated, with many of the audit reports proving troublesome for the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government.

The CAG‘s reports on the 2010 Commonwealth Games and allocation of licenses for 2G telecom spectrum and coal mining blocks have severely dented the UPA government’s image and provided ammunition to the opposition. There have been also suggestions of the CAG has exceeded its brief.

“Nobody in the political class, except for saying that I have political aspirations or that I am looking for a post-retirement career in politics, has actually made any substantive criticism of my work…Saying that I want a political career is an easy allegation to make,” Rai said in an interview.

Rai’s term as CAG also coincided with the resurgence of the civil society movement against corruption and a call for a change in the governance structure in the country.

“There has been an erosion of people’s faith in government. Their confidence in public institutions has declined,” Rai said, echoing the popular sentiment in a speech at the Sardar Vallabhai Patel National Police Academy in Hyderabad in 2011.

Rai also saw to it that the CAG reports are prepared in a manner which can be understood by the common man and are made available to the wider public through issue of “Noddy Books”, brief compilations of large reports.

Officials in the CAG office told IANS that Rai had taken steps to make audit reports relevant and timely and his initiatives have made an impact among the people.

“He (Rai) insisted on bringing down average time period (for a report)…CAG report is essentially a post-mortem and people tend to lose interest if there is wide time gap. He made the report more relevant and timely,” an official told reporters.

“He has also insisted that the language of audit reports should not be technical and should be reader friendly,” the official added.

He said Rai had told his officials to focus on big-ticket expenditure where huge public money was involved and also encouraged them to improve their professional skills.

Rai, who holds a masters’ degrees in economics and public administration from the Delhi Scool of Economics and Harvard respectively, also saw that the CAG also works towards building a team to carry out specialised audits and possibly enter the area of environmental auditing.

Another step taken by Rai, a 1972-batch, Kerala-cadre officer of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), was to improve access of media to his office. He appointed a media advisor in 2010.

BS Chauhan, who was appointed media advisor, said there has been a transformation in media coverage of CAG events in the last five years.

“In 2008, the then president inaugurated the CAG building and one newspaper wrote about it. Earlier this month, when the International Centre for Environmental Audit and Sustainable Development was inaugurated in Jaipur, most (Indian) news channels covered it. There were 53 press clippings of Delhi and Jaipur papers,” Chauhan said.

Rai’s tenure as CAG has drawn parallels in public perception with that of TN Seshan as Chief Election Commissioner in the 1990s for ensuring free and fair polls. Chauhan, who also worked with Seshan, said that the people started relating to moves of the EC after Seshan made his office more accessible to media.

Rai, who has made it clear that he is not going to join politics, is also a keen tennis player and has interest in cricket and mountaineering, hobbies that he hopes to pursue in his retirement years.