Supreme Court to hear Karnataka-TN power row

Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam, appearing for SRLDC before a bench headed by Justice S H Kapadia, sought urgent hearing on the application as both high courts had given conflicting directions in the matter, which SRLDC—a government body—is unable to follow.
The Madras High Court on April 7 restrained the JSW Power Trading Company Limited from cancelling or curtailing the scheduling of round-the-clock power supply to Tamil Nadu. And the Karnataka High Court on April 8 asked the company to give effect to the April 3 order by the Karnataka government to stop all export outside the State citing acute shortage of power. In its transfer petition, the SRLDC said it had territorial jurisdiction for the southern region for discharging the functions of inter-State transmission of electricity.

The Madras High Court has restrained the SRLDC in Bangalore, a statutory body established under the Electricity Act, 2003, from cancelling or curtailing supply of RTC (round the clock) power of 300 MW up to the month of May 2010 to the TNEB.  The Karnataka government had issued its directives after the Karnataka High Court recently upheld the state government’s powers to invoke section 11 of the Electricity Act.