PSEB may slap penalty on BHEL for delay in Lehra Mohabbat Stage IV
The Punjab State Electricity Board (PSEB) is likely to slap a penalty up to five per cent on the Bharat Heavy Electrical Limited (BHEL) for delay in commissioning of the Lehra Mohabbat Stage-4 (250x2 MW) thermal plant of 500 MW. PSEB sources told The Pioneer here on Thursday that the BHEL had delayed the commissioning from June 2007, to October 2007. Resultantly, the PSEB has incurred a loss of about Rs 250 crore due to the delay in the project. Initially, Stage-4 of the Lehra Mohabbat project was expected to cost Rs 1,789 crore. It is pertinent to mention that in March 2007, the BHEL had informed the PSEB that it might not be able to commission unit 3 of the Lehra Mohabbat-II thermal power project during the Tenth plan period as per schedule. Unit 3 was commissioned in April 2008, but it is yet to stabilise. BHEL, along with Alstom, has been working on this project since 2004. The PSEB had already slapped the penalty of Rs 95 crore on them for delaying unit 3, and now the board will consider levelling another penalty for delay in unit 4 in the meeting of whole time members, schedule for later this month.
