Commissioner/Secretary, Power Development Department, Hirdesh Kumar, today visited Sawalakot and inspected pre-project works besides reviewing the progress of Ramban, Doda and Kishtwar districts under various Centrally Sponsored schemes of Power sector.During the visit, Kumar inspected various ongoing related works and instructed the executing agencies to expedite the pre-project works for developing suitable environment for construction of prestigious Sawalakot Hydel Project.While responding to issues and bottlenecks put forth by the officers of JKSPDC, Kumar gave on spot directions for resolving the same and informed that a high-level committee will be framed to resolve the bottlenecks soon.He also reviewed the progress of shifting of HT Towers which are in danger or have come under the alignment of four-lane project and other utilities including their reinstallation. He directed the officers of NHAI to take up the shifting work of tower in time to avoid any power breakdown and untoward incident besides ensuring immediate protection of vulnerable towers.Kumar further took a comprehensive review of schemes viz SAUBHAGYA, UJALA, PMDP, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana and directed the concerned for achieving 100% target of electrification of all households under SAUBHAGYA by the month of November.He said that various innovative provisions will be taken for covering the hilly and far flung areas of district Ramban, Doda and Kishtwar.
Taking strong note of instances where in a single house, many families residing as separate households avail electricity from a single registered connection and at the same time avail subsidized ration from FCS&CA stores with the help of individual ration Cards, Kumar instructed for correcting such anomalies so that every household is registered with the department for availing benefits under various Central and State sponsored schemes.The XEns were directed to increase their efforts to complete the process of crosschecking the beneficiaries availing electricity with ground reality so that unauthorized connections could be identified.Meanwhile, District Development Commissioner, Ramban, Showkat Aijaz Bhat informed the chair about the status of critical receiving stations and proposed their augmentation. Commissioner/Secretary said that all measures will be taken for augmenting the capacity of these receiving stations for uninterrupted power supply to the people of the district.The DDC assured full cooperation and coordination to PDD for regularizing unauthorized connections and for uploading the updated details of beneficiaries on the concerned portal. Special Gram Sabhas are being held for identification of beneficiaries and generation of awareness, he added.The meeting was attended by SSP, Anita Sharma, Director Planning PDD Rakesh Jamwal, Chief Engineer (CE) S&O wing, PDD, Avinash Dubey, C E P&MM Srinagar, Sunil Kumar, ADC, Dr Gurvinderjeet Singh, CPO, Uttam Singh, S E Project wing, AK Chibber, SE S&O circle-I, Jammu, Gurmeet Singh, E D JKPDC, Prem Nath, , XENs of Doda, Kishtwar, Ramban, XENs, TLMD, STD Udhampur besides representatives of construction companies and other concerned officers.