A meeting of the top officials of PDB and chiefs of different entities in power sector, including Dhaka Electricity Supply Authority (DESA), Dhaka Electric Supply Company (DESCO) and Rural Electrification Board (REB), at the Power Ministry took the decision in view of the exigency.

Power and Energy Adviser Tapan Chowdhury presided over the meeting, where military help was offered for smooth run of power plants.

Chief of the special taskforce on power and energy Major General Abdul Wadud was also present at the meeting.

As per decision, the CMC, comprising mid-level officials of different power utilities like Power Development Board (PDB), DESA, REB, DESCO and PGCB, will resume function today to meet the problem head on.

The CMC will monitor the power-supply situation and work together in a coordinated manner to tackle the power crisis so that load could be distributed rationally across the country.

Official sources said the meeting was convened against the backdrop of recent fall in power generation following sudden breakdown of different power plants.

Country's power generation hurtled down to about 3,000 megawatts from last month's 3,500 MW as a number of generation units at Ghorasal and Ashuganj stations shut down.

The officials, however, told the meeting that most of the generation units are very old which now run at 'de-rated capacity' and often face closure in the hot weather.

The adviser asked them to closely monitor the generation units and take instant measures to repair the faults shortly after their shutdown.

Sources said the taskforce chief offered the armed forces' help for smooth operation of the power plants.

The adviser asked the PDB officials to take special initiative to pursue the captive power producers to sell their electricity to the government to feed the power-hungry national grid.

He also ordered the PDB officials to investigate into the matters as to why the independent power producer Westmont Company repeatedly failed its deadline to come into production.

After the meeting, the power adviser told reporters that Annual Development Programme (ADP)'s about Tk 3600-crore allocation would be spent on installation of new power plants and maintenance of old ones.