'Govt must adopt plan for power supply'

hyderabad: india needs to prioritise its reform tasks for the next five years if it has to develop a national level competitive power market. to move in the direction, the centre should adopt a comprehensive reform plan for power supply and adhere to a firm plan on introducing market mechanisms. while the reform plan would help introduce competition to the electricity sector, the central government should adhere to a firm time-table for introducing market mechanisms such as creating a framework for a national level power market and making the states accountable for the performances of their utilities. the recommendations form part of a study published as “electricity in india: providing power for the millions�, undertaken by international energy agency (iea) to provide an assessment of india’s electricity liberalisation efforts. an autonomous body established within the framework of the organisation for economic co-operation and development (oecd), the iea implements an international energy programme across its member countries. the iea views that the markets work best when they respond to market forces alone, which will be the case even for india in the future. “india is still far from the point where a competitive market can govern the supply-demand balance. however, india’s eventual target should be an electricity market,� the study says. the first step toward such a national market would be increased investment in a national electricity grid by giving more freedom to market players to exchange and trade across state borders, iea study adds.