Bhubaneswar: Chief minister Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday directed officials to provide electricity to all households in the state by October 2 next.

The direction was issued at a meeting presided over by Naveen to review the progress of rural electrification work in the state.

It was revealed from the review that power connection had been given to as many as 47,655 villages out of total 47,655 villages of the state. Electrification of only 22 villages has remained incomplete.

The work was expected to be complete by this month end.

The chief minister advised the officials to lay more focus on the 22,000 partially electrified villages. Most of such villages were located in the hilly and tribal-dominated districts such as Keonjhar, Mayurbhanj, Koraput, Balangir, Kandhamal and Gajapati.

The meeting set a target to complete the power job in three districts in each month, so that all the villages in all the districts could be electrified within next 10 months.

Similarly, 28 lakh households will be provided electricity connection on war footing by October 2, so that all the households would be covered by then.

The chief minister ordered to hold review meetings by the chief secretary, district collectors and the executing organisations every month.

Energy secretary Hemant Kumar Sharma had informed that a detailed project report was prepared to electrify 3,474 un-electrified villages.

So far, 3,150 villages have been connected with power supply.

Padhi instructed the energy department to electrify all the rest 324 villages within December 2017.