Patna, May 27: Energy minister Vijendra Prasad Yadav today said privatisation of the Bihar State Electricity Board (BSEB) is imminent if its top officials did not raise their efficiency and performance levels.

Yadav, while inaugurating a two-day review meeting of departmental heads of the board, said: “People from the union are opposing the privatisation (of the board) but that is bound to happen if you (board officials) do not increase your efficiency levels. It is a very simple rule that if you earn (a revenue), you will be paid and if you do not work hard, it will be difficult to give you salary and pension.”

Making his stand on the performance of the employees, the minister said the performance and non-performance should be taken into consideration before preparing an annual confidential report (ACR).

After giving a direction to board chairman P.K. Rai to replace all vehicles which are more than 10 years old, Yadav said those officers who have performed well would be awarded with the new vehicles.

“The energy department has got the biggest allocation in the history (of the state budget),” he said, adding that money would not be a constraint if it has to be spent on capacity and efficiency building, expansion and modernisation of plant but “there should be some accountability and responsibility for the officers”.

“The government has been trying hard to put things on track and hence we appeal to the officials and employees not to go on a strike for at least a year,” Yadav said, adding that it would give the government an opportunity to break the myth about its image of non-performance.

Energy department’s principal secretary Ajay Nayak said there is a need to prepare a complete database of everything to avoid any fight or buck-passing in an issue. “If the data is available, we can take punitive action even against a general manager so that a particular scheme is not delayed,” he said.