West Bengal to split SEB for transmission, distribution
West Bengal State Electricity Board (WBSEB) is being split into two entities - West Bengal Transmission (WBTC) and West Bengal Distribution (WBDC).
By Sutanuka Ghosal, TNN |
KOLKATA: West Bengal State Electricity Board (WBSEB) is being split into two entities — West Bengal Transmission (WBTC) and West Bengal Distribution (WBDC).
The state cabinet is expected to give its clearance to the move on November 30, ’06, state power secretary Sunil Mitra said. Both WBTC and WBDC will be 100% controlled by the West Bengal government and 50% of their respective boards are likely to have non-executive directors.
West Bengal government also plans to hire professional independent directors on the twin boards. The complex registration process of the two new entities will start by late October.
Their proposed corporate structures have been approved by the empowered committee on power sector reforms which comprises state commerce and industry minister Nirupam Sen, Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta, power minister Mrinal Banerjee, the chief secretary, the finance secretary and the state public enterprises secretary. Mr Mitra will be the convenor of this empowered committee.
In a radical departure from existing practices, HR issues like incentives, promotions and salary revisions of all employees of the unbundled WBSEB will be linked to performance and efficiency parameters. The twin boards will be suitably empowered to take independent decisions on recruitment. The state power secretary, however, stressed that the West Bengal government was not considering mass retrenchment of WBSEB staffers.
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Currently, WBSEB has 28,000 employees, of which about 80% will be absorbed in the proposed distribution company while the balance 20% will move to the state-owned transmission company. Significantly, to secure total support of WBSEB employees for the upcoming restructuring exercise, the state government has decided to set up a pension fund trust. The corpus of the trust has been pegged at Rs 3,300 crore which will handle the pension dues.
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