BY TC News Desk
Agartala, December 31, 2022: Deputy Chief Minister Jishnu Dev Varma on Saturday said that the Power department has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Asian Development Bank of Rs 2,275 crore for power distribution strengthening and generation efficiency improvement project.
This project will benefit about 5-6 lakh of consumers through improvement of power supply and reliability. The project will generate about 6,500 jobs directly or indirectly in the state, said Dev Varma, who is also looking after Power department in a press conference at Civil Secretariat here on Saturday afternoon.
He said “The project will have Rs 1820 crore loan from ADB and Rs 455 crore of direct investment by the state government in power sector. Project will improve energy security, quality of supply, efficiency and resilience of power sector in Tripura. The state government will repay Rs 155 crore and central government will repay rest of the loan as this project is an Externally Aided Project (EAP)”
On behalf of the state government, Deputy CM expressed gratitude to the ministry of Finance and the Asian Development bank for making this possible, approving and giving such a huge gift to the people of Tripura ahead of new year.The project agreement was signed between Power Department secretary Brijesh Pandey and Officer-in-Charge of ADB’s India Resident Mission NilayaMitash.
The state government has not increased electricity rates for last five years to ensure affordable and reliable power to all. All the increase in cost of electricity has been borne by the state government. A total investment of above Rs 2000 crore has been made in last five years to strengthen the power sector transmission and distribution network in the state.
Under this RDSS Scheme 5.47 Lac Smart and Prepaid Meters will be installed in Consumer premises. In addition, 8720km LT Arial Bunched (AB) Cable and 830 Distribution Transformers (DTs) will be installed.
