Hyderabad: The Chief Minister Sri N Kiran Kumar Reddy today spoke to the Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh over phone and requested for additional allocation of gas, power and coal for Andhra Pradesh.

The Chief Minister said due to the ongoing strike in the Singareni Collieries, generation of power from coal-based power units of APGenco and NTPC has been severely affected. There is severe shortage of power in the State due to the strike. This has created lots of hardships to the people particularly the students, farmers and the common man. "Our intention is to lessen the hardships being faced by the common man due to the strike", the CM said.

 It may be recalled that the Chief Minister also wrote a letter to the Prime Minister in this regard. The Prime Minister immediately responded and directed the three Ministries to give top priority to A.P.'s request. He said Andhra Pradesh requests should be attended on top priority. The Prime Minister spoke to the Power Secretary, Coal Secretary and NTPC Chief in this regard. The Chief Minister said the ministry of power, Government of India have been requested to allocate additional 500 MW of power from unallocated power of Central Generating Stations (CGS) in Southern region to tide over the present crisis.

The Chief Minister told the PM that the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas have been requested to divert 1.7 MMSCMD of natural gas of M/s GMR Vemagiri and other mini gas based projects to other standard gas based IPPs of A.P. Meanwhile the Chief Minister said he also requested the Ministry of Coal, Government of India to direct Mahanadi Coal Fields to allot at least 30000 MT of Coal to APGENCO, Similarly, allocation of 4 lakh MT of Coal from Western Coal Limited and 5 lakh MT of Coal from Central Coal Fields have been requested to meet the requirement of APGENCO's Thermal stations.

The Chief Minister also told the Prime Minister that he has personally spoken to all the concerned Ministers and the officials of the State are in touch with the respective Ministries' officials. He requested the Prime Minister that necessary instructions may kindly be given immediately to these Ministries to take immediate necessary action as requested by Andhra Pradesh Government to tide over the present crisis.