Patiala, June 20 -- Amid an already strained power supply owing to sweltering heat and paddy transplantation season, Punjab's power generation suffered a major setback on Friday as six thermal units across four power plants remained shut due to technical snags.

This resulted in the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited generating only 3,235 MW power against the total thermal capacity of 5,680 MW - a loss of 1,810 MW of generation capacity.

Compounding the situation, contractual workers, who have been on strike for the past few days for absorption into the PSPCL, have refused to carry out the repair work until their demand is met.

According to available data, PSPCL is already drawing more than 10,000 MW from the northern grid (central ...