Bijendra Prasad Yadav inaugurates video conferencing facility at Vidyut Bhavan in Patna on Saturday. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

Patna, May 5: Energy minister Bijendra Prasad Yadav today said stern action would be taken against Bihar State Electricity Board employees if they did not improve their efficiency.

Inaugurating a meeting of the state electricity board’s principal officers, he said the board should slash increment of officials who had either not performed well or had the maximum number of complaints pending against them.

“The board officers should report to office on time, carry out field inspections regularly, shed the ‘chalta hai’ attitude (casual approach) and behave with consumers properly,” Yadav said. He added that the board would reward the “performing officers and employees”, against whom there are fewer complaints.

Though the minister admitted that there were problems and irregularities in the board, he gave a “corruption-free certificate” to its top management. “I am not saying that everything is fine in the board and there are no problems. But I don’t have any hesitation in saying that there is no corruption at the top level of the board,” he said.

Stating that there are only two power boards — one in Gujarat and the other in Sikkim — that were not incurring losses, Yadav said: “Revenue is not a problem at all. But the quantum of money invested in the board does not commensurate with the result it has given in recent years.”

“When the NDA government came to power in Bihar in 2005, it increased the financial support to the board from Rs 30 crore per month to Rs 180 crore per month. But the revenue realisation is hovering around Rs 250 crore per month as against Rs 68 crore per month in 2005. This shows that revenue realisation does not commensurate the financial support that the government is providing to the board,” he said.

Yadav inaugurated the board’s video-conferencing facility at Vidyut Bhavan to facilitate frequent interactions with field officers posted in far-flung areas of the state.

Principal secretary (energy) Ajay V Nayak and all 10 general managers-cum-chief engineers, 15 heads of departments of chief engineer level, nodal officers were present during the principal officers’ meeting that was convened to review the progress of various departments.