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| Prime Minister Narendra Modi. (PTI) |
Agartala, Nov. 13: The CPM-led Left Front government in Tripura has recently invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi to inaugurate the second unit of the 726.6MW thermal power plant at Palatana in Gomati district despite its ideological opposition to the BJP and Sangh Parivar.
The first unit, with an installed capacity of 363.13MW, had earlier been inaugurated on June 20 last year by President Pranab Mukherjee though at the time of inauguration, the first unit could generate only 81MW.
Since the very beginning, production in the first unit of Palatana was plagued by infiltration of mud and slush along with natural gas supplied to the turbines through pipeline. A concerted and prolonged effort by the ONGC Tripura Power Corporation (OTPC), the company that owns and runs Palatana, restored a semblance of normality in the first unit’s productive capacity by involving American engineers.
The work on the second unit, which has now been completed, is awaiting commissioning.
Since Modi will pay a four-day visit to the Northeast later this month, the state government is desperate to have a brief visit to Tripura included in his programme to ensure inauguration of the second unit of Palatana. To this end, chief minister Manik Sarkar held a high-powered meeting in the state secretariat to finalise the modalities to accord a red carpet welcome to Modi.
The chief minister, accompanied by minister for PWD Badal Chowdhury and power minister Manik Dey, visited the Palatana area and supervised the preparedness of the site for the Prime Minister’s visit. Sarkar will again hold a meeting this evening to discuss the ongoing preparation for making the visit a grand success.
Sources in the state secretariat, however, said there was still no confirmation of the visit though efforts were on to persuade the Prime Minister, his staff and security officials.
“The trouble is that he works on such a hectic schedule that once he returns from the Northeast it will be difficult to find another date; that is why we are trying to have the visit during his stay in the Northeast,” a senior official of the state secretariat said.