Much ahead of the next Assembly elections, the State Government has set a target to provide electricity to all villages by June 2018.
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik issued a direction in this regard while reviewing the progress in rural electrification activities here on Monday. Energy Minister Prafulla Mallick and concerned officials were present.
Notably, the State Government’s decision came close after BJP president Amit Shah criticised it for not being able to reach electricity to all villages despite the BJD completing 17 years in office.
The Chief Minister asked the officials to complete electrification in all partially-electrified villages and provide electricity to all non-electrified villages before June 2018.
Of the total 47,677 villages in the State, 46,927 villages are officially electrified while the remaining 750 villages are yet to get the facility, sources said.
The Central public sector undertaking (CPSUs) like NTPC and PGCIl and State PSUs like OPTCl and OREDA have been entrusted with rural electrification works.
Most of the CPSUs are going slow over the task. Recently, while lauding efforts of the State Government on rural electrification, Union Power Secretary AK Bhalla asked CPSU officials to stick to the timeline in executing the jobs.
Of the total 28,165 partially-electrified villages, complete electrification has been done in 7,856 while works are to be completed in the rest 20,309 villages by June 2018.
This will cost an additional amount of Rs 1,700 crore; and in the State
Budget allocations would have to made during 2017-18 and 2018-19.
There would be GST impact on rural electrification with the total cost coming to Rs 6,926 crore whereas earlier it was Rs 5,226 crore.