The Union power minister, Suresh Prabhu, when contacted, confirmed the constitution of this committee. This task force will assess the impact of various measures taken by the Centre in the past and will be asked to make recommendations with the objective of "power to all by 2012" and suggest corrective policy measures for providing an impetus to the investments, both public and private, in this sector.

Giving details, sources said this will be a 21-member task force and will have union secretaries from various related ministries and departments such as finance, petroleum, coal, non-conventional energy and Planning Commission. The chairman of all the power PSUs along with the chairman of BSES and Nuclear Power Corporation, will also be a part of this committee.

From states, this committee will have participation of the respective chief secretaries from Andhra Pradesh and Bihar. This committee will also have participation from various industry bodies such as FICCI, CII, Assocham, Independent power Producers Association. Power sector experts such as directors of TERI, ASCI and Indira Gandhi Institute for Development Reasearch will also be members of this committee.

The decision to constitute this task force comes close on heels of another high-powered expert group under the chairmanship of Montek Singh Ahluwalia, set up on March 5, by the government for recommending one time settlement of outstanding dues of the state electricity boards (SEBs) towards the central public sector undertakings.

Interestingly, Mr Prabhu seems very fond of constituting many such committees at various levels as he has even outscored all his predecessors on this front. Mr Prabhu, after taking charge of the power ministry has constituted as many as 15 committees in this sector during his six months tenure.

Other important committees set up by Mr Prabhu since Jan 2001 includes the one headed by chairman, CEA for preparing a perspective R&D plan for the next 15 years (set up on Feb 26, 2001), committee on formulation of a tariff policy (19, Feb 2001), co-ordination committee on implementation of action plan for initiatives concerning IPPs (on Jan 8, 2001), a joint business forum under the chairmanship of power minister himself (Jan 4, 2001) and three committees on financial restructuring of the power sector in states of Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa (Jan 1, 2001).