With neither cash nor coal stocks, the state¡¯s premier thermal power station Tenughat Vidyut Nigam Limited (TVNL) is on the brink of a disaster.

With the state government failing to nominate either a full-time chairman and a managing director over the past three weeks to head the operations, it has become more vulnerable as not a single official at TVNL can draw cash or sanction expenses.

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TVNL has coal stock of 286 tonne, against a normal requirement of 1.5 lakh tonne. With such low coal stock, only one unit is being run. Coal supplies have also been stopped by Central Coalfields Ltd as TVNL has no chair- man or managing director to make payments,¡± said TVNL insiders.

TVNL has two units, which have an installed capacity of 440MW.

One unit, which was badly damaged in May last year and has now been repaired at a cost of Rs 50 crore cannot work due to low coal stock. In case both units are operated, the entire stock would be wiped out within a week.

Reserves of light diesel at TVNL are also at a paltry 200 kilolitres (KL). To run both the units, minimum reserve of 600KL is needed to be maintained. Thermal plants are run on coal, though every time a unit has to be shut down, diesel is needed to light up the units. Payment of 600 kilolitres has already been made though supplies are still awaited, as Indian Oil, Barauni, does not have stocks either, said sources.

TVNL sources revealed that since June 18 the generating authority has been headless. It is being managed by chief engineers and general managers who do not have administrative or financial powers.

As a stop-gap arrangement, present energy secretary Aditya Swarup was nominated chairman and Jharkhand State Electricity Board general manager B. Ram was made the managing director with three-month tenure. Though their respective tenures were extended for three more months, since June 18 their extensions have not been approved.

Today, a large part of the state was forced to go without power after two units of Patratu Thermal Power Station (PTPS) collapsed because rainwater seeped into the boiler parts of two of the units, reducing the total generation to a paltry 20MW as against an installed capacity of 840MW.

¡°At present only one unit at PTPS is being operated. Two other units, where rainwater had seeped into the boiler units had to be shut down. However, by late evening today, two more units would begin generation,¡± said Patratu Thermal general manager S.N. Pandey.