Uninterrupted power to farmers in two years: Piyush Goyal

The Narendra Modi government will provide "uninterrupted" electricity through dedicated feeders to farmers across India in the next two years, Union Power Minister Piyush Goyal said Saturday.

"The Modi government would help Bihar in the power sector and ensure 24x7 power supply across the state," Goyal said after commercially launching unit IV of the NTPC Barh Super Thermal Power Plant (STPP) at Barh in Patna district.

"We have begun the process to supply uninterrupted electricity through dedicated feeders to farmers for irrigation in the country in next two years," Goyal told media persons.

The minister also launched the commercial operation of the 110 MW unit II of the Muzaffarpur Thermal power station (Stage I).

With the two new plants, Bihar will get an additional 540 MW of power from Saturday, in addition to the current allocation of 1,948 MW from the central sector.

"Bihar will get 429.5 MW of power from the Barh plant and 110 MW from Muzaffarpur," an official said.

According to officials of the state energy department, the Barh STTP has a capacity of 660 MW, of which Bihar will get 430 MW.

Goyal said farmers in Gujarat get uninterrupted electricity through dedicated feeders under the Deendayal Upadhyay Gram Jyoti Yojna.

"It is a successful scheme to provide power to farmers for irrigation in Gujarat. Now this model will be implemented across the country," he said.

Goyal said the scheme will be launched in Bihar soon.

"The central government with the help of Bihar government, which is also keen to provide power to farmers for irrigation, would launch the scheme to supply power through dedicated feeders," he said.

All pending power projects in Bihar would be completed to ensure adequate power to the state, he said.

According to him, the Modi government was doing everything to improve the power situation in the eastern states, particularly in Bihar.

"We have clear cut instructions from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to extend all help to eastern states, including Bihar, to make them self-reliant in the power sector," he said.

Bihar Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi and six union ministers from Bihar - Ravi Shankar Prasad, Radha Mohan Singh, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Ram Kripal Yadav, Giriraj Singh and Dharmendra Pradhan - were present along with Goyal.

Meanwhile, Bihar's ruling Janata Dal-United accused the central government of ignoring and neglecting the contributions of former chief minister Nitish Kumar by not inviting him to the event.

"The NTPC Barh STPP was a dream project of Nitish Kumar, who played a major role in it. But he was neither invited for the launch nor was his name mentioned in banners and posters at the function. This has again exposed the 'hate politics' of the BJP," Bihar's Urban Development Minister Samrat Choudhary told media persons here.