Patna: Bihar officials feel they have struck a good deal in the handover of three power plants to the NTPC.

Bihar State Power Generation Company Limited (BSPGCL) managing director R. Lakshmanan said Bihar is likely to get over Rs 5,500 crore in addition to the Rs 875 crore the state will save annually because the NTPC will be able to generate power cheaper.

The NTPC will pay around Rs 3,500 crore to the state for the Barauni thermal power station, a fully owned subsidiary of the BSPGCL. The plant has a 110 MW unit and another such unit and two extension units of 250 MW each are likely to start commercial production soon.

The state will get Rs 400 crore against its equity in the 610 MW Kanti Bijli Utpadan Nigam Limited plant in Muzaffarpur, an NTPC-BSPGCL joint venture. The plant has two functional units of 110MW each and two more units (195 MW each) are to start commercial production soon.

For the Nabinagar plant in Aurangabad, which is a 50:50 joint venture between NTPC and BSPGCL and has three production units of 660 MW each, the state will get around Rs 1,700 crore for its equity.

"The final figures may change once the details are worked out," Lakshmanan said. "Around Rs 4,000 crore would be used for paying back loans taken from different agencies and another Rs 400 be used for clearing the dues of NTPC against the power purchase." The rest would be used to complete the two units at the Barauni plant, he added.

Corrections

There were a few errors in the article headlined "Three plants go to NTPC" published in the May 16 edition of The Telegraph. The correct information is as follows:

The memorandum of understanding for handing over the three power plants to the NTPC is on a 33-year lease and not 30 years as reported. Also, the Barauni power plant was fully owned by the state . The associated land at this plant has been provided to NTPC on lease for a period of 33 years.

Equity of the BSPGCL in the Kanti unit will be bought out by NTPC.Land there was already provided to the company on lease. Equity of the generation company in the Nabinagar plant will be bought out by NTPC. Associated land at this thermal power plant belongs to the joint venture and with BSPGCL equity buyout by the NTPC the land will be completely transferred to NTPC.

Also, BSPGCL employees are posted at only Barauni. The other two plants at Kanti and Nabinagar are manned by the NTPC. Hence, BSGCL employees posted in Barauni and BSPGCL headquarters Patna will be posted in transmission, distribution and holding companies.