Government decides to speed up Rs. 90,000 crore power projects.

While the government seeks to reform the land acquisition law this week, it has decided to fast-track 10 power projects worth Rs. 90,000 crore planned by state-owned companies led by NTPC, which have been held up by land-related issues, identified in the Economic Survey as the biggest hurdle for stalled public sector investments.

In a bid to jumpstart economic activity through public investments, the power ministry last week turned to the cabinet secretariat's project monitoring group to help bring back on track stalled investments involving over 15,600 MW of capacity and critical transmission lines for states such as Jammu & Kashmir.

After factoring in the 10 projects taken up by the power ministry, 305 projects worth Rs. 18.85 lakh crore are now awaiting government intervention to get off the ground, including 97 public and private sector power projects with investments of Rs. 6.33 lakh crore.

The group, set up to unlock hurdles facing big-ticket and strategic investments, has so far resolved problems facing over 200 projects worth Rs. 6.9 lakh crore. These included about 100 power projects worth Rs. 3.53 lakh crore, though some of them have come back to seek intervention on new hurdles that have emerged on their road to commissioning.


ET