The Tamil Nadu Cauvery Farmers Protection Association has appealed to the Tamil Nadu government to enhance the farm power connection allotment for 2026-27 so as to clear a portion of more than two lakh applications pending for more than two decades.
In a statement addressed to Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay, association secretary Sundara Vimalanathan has said that a total of 2.86 lakh farmers have registered for free farm power connection, including self-financing scheme, since 2004. At the same time, 89,289 farmers have opted for farm power connection under the ‘tatkal’ scheme by remitting a total of ₹2,431 crore. Out them, 44,993 have been provided with power connection under the scheme till last year.
An allocation of 50,000 farm power connections for 2026-27 will not address the issue of delay in providing free agriculture pump set energisation facility to over two lakh farmers for more than two decades.
The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court, while hearing a petition relating to farm power connections, had raised several questions over the delay in providing connections under the ‘tatkal’ scheme through which the Electricity Department had mopped up around ₹2,431 crore as ‘charges’ for providing the connection.
If priority is be given to the pending ‘tatkal’ scheme applications in view of the litigation, less than 6,000 connections out of the allotted 50,000 for the next financial year, will only be available for general and self-financing farm power connection applications pending with the Electricity Board.
Hence, the allotment of farm power connection number must be doubled so that a good number of farmers waiting to energise their pump sets with free power under the general category and self-financing scheme category will stand to benefit, he said.
Published – September 15, 2026 05:01 pm IST
