Tangedco officials told to form 2 safety teams in every circle

CHENNAI: Electricity Minister V Senthilbalaji on Tuesday directed all the distribution region chief engineers and superintendent engineers of the circles to appoint executive engineers (general) as an officer on special duty and form two safety teams under him/her.

Reviewing Northeast Monsoon preparedness work by Tangedco, the minister said that for the ensuing monsoon season, safety teams should ensure that all the safety equipment and tree-cutting equipment are ready to use.

He instructed officials to complete the works to increase the height of the pillar boxes by one meters in Chennai and suburban areas by end of this month. He asked executive engineers and assistant executive engineers to conduct a field inspection to ensure proper upkeep of the pillar boxes.

The steps should be taken on war footing to prevent the snapping of overhead cables during rain combined with heavy winds. “In case of power outages, the power supply should be restored on a priority basis to the hospitals, drinking water mains, government offices, banks and mobile phone towers.”

Senthilbalaji said that the number of calls that the Minnagam, the call centre for electricity consumers to report their grievances, can handle at a time will be increased from 60 to 75 ahead of the monsoon.

On the complaints of the calls to 9498794987 getting dropped after being on hold for a long time, the minister said that the number of calls had been restricted to 60 in order to not make the facility overstaffed. "However, since more grievance calls are anticipated during monsoon, the facility will be expanded so that at least 75 calls can be answered at a time, " he said. He said that Tangedco is equipped to face the monsoon-related issues this year as precautionary measures have been carried out and added that there is enough stock of transformers and electric poles.