Cabinet approves revised cost of Rs 6,700 crore project for Northeast power project

Kohima: The Cabinet Committee of Economic Affairs (CCEA) which was chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on December 16 had approved the Revised Cost Estimate (RCE) of North Eastern Region Power System Improvement Project (NERPSIP) at an estimated cost of Rs 6,700 crore.

This is viewed as a major step towards the economic development of the North Eastern Region through the strengthening of Intra-State Transmission and Distribution systems.

The scheme is being implemented through Powergrid which is a Public Sector Undertaking (PSU) under the Ministry of Power in association with six beneficiaries North Eastern States namely, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura and is targeted to be commissioned by December 2021.

After commissioning, the project will be owned and maintained by the respective North-Eastern State Utilities.

Implementation of this scheme is going to create a reliable power grid and improve NER states' connectivity for the upcoming load centres, and thus extend the benefits of the grid-connected power to all categories of consumers of beneficiaries in North Eastern Region.

The scheme will also help to increase the per capita income power consumption of these states and would contribute to the total economic development of the Northeastern region. Implementing agencies are actively hiring a considerable number of local manpower during their construction works which help to generate a lot of employment for skilled and unskilled manpower of Northeastern region.

Once the completion of the work, additional manpower would be required for Operation and Maintenance of these newly created assets as per the standard norms which generate considerable additional employment opportunities for the region.

The scheme was initially approved in December 2014 as a Central Sector Plan Scheme of Ministry of Power and is being funded with the assistance of World Bank fund and by the Government of India through the budget support of Ministry of Power on 50:50 basis (World Bank: Gol) except for the capacity building component for Rs 89 crore, which will be completely funded by the Government of India.

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