AGARTALA: The Left Front government in Tripura has decided to install smart electricity consumption meters up to household level across the state in a time bound manner to ensure cent per cent collection of power bill on time.
Power Minister Manik Dey said here on Saturday that in first phase at least 45,000 conventional bill meters would be replaced with smart meters in Agartala within the next two months. Out of 1.5 lakh odd customers’ households smart meters have already been installed in more than 8000 households.
“The smart meter will ensure auto power cut to the individual household unless the power bill is paid on time and immediately after payment power service will be restored automatically, which would not require human intervention in the process,” Dey stated.
He said Tripura has already achieved almost 80 per cent on-time billing and bill collection but in remaining 20 per cent cases bill collected later that directly increase the liability on Tripura State Electricity Corporation Ltd which being a distribution company has to pay the power generation companies in every month.
The government stressed on the need for introducing on time power bill collection after improving the loss of power during transmission and distribution over the years.
World Bank has sanctioned a project of Rest 1300 crore to Tripura for further improvement of power distribution network. The work has been started for Rs 1087 crore.
The state government has sanctioned Rs 72 crore for carrying out underground cable transmission line in Agartala and a company has been appointed for preparation of Detail Project Report (DPR). On the other hand, the Centre has allocated only Rs 73 crore under Integrated Power Development Scheme for urban areas and Rs 74.12 crore for rural areas.
He further stated in the last financial year altogether 1542 habitations were fully covered with the power supply. UNI