Kathmandu: A contract agreement has been signed to improve the electricity transmission and distribution system of eight districts in Province 2. The Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) and Tata Project Limited on Wednesday signed a contract worth around Rs 4 billion for the implementation of the Province 2 Rural Electrification Project.

The project will work in Saptari, Siraha, Dhanusha, Mahottari, Sarlahi, Rautahat, Bara and Parsa of Province 2.

According to NEA, 8 substations of 33/11 KV, 16.6 MVA capacity with modern equipment will be constructed in order to make the power supply of the districts in Province 2 reliable and qualitative through the project. Similarly, two substations of 33/11 KV, 8 MVA capacity will be constructed.

In addition to this, the 323 circuit kilometers 33 kV transmission line, 950 circuit kilometers 11 kV line and 1000 circuit kilometers 400-volt line will be constructed in the districts of Province 2. The Norwegian government has provided a grant of 35 million US dollars for the implementation of the project. This grant will be provided through the Asian Development Bank.

Bodhraj Dhakal, the coordinator of the project, said the industry and household beneficiaries will be able to use enough and reliable electricity as the overall power transmission and distribution system of Province 2 will improve drastically after the completion of the work. He urged the contractor company to complete the work ahead of schedule as it is a high-priority project.

The construction contract agreement of the project is targeted to be completed within 900 days--30 months of the beginning of the implementation.

Project Chief of the Tata Project, Sandeep Kumar, expressed his commitment to move ahead with the goal of completing the work ahead of schedule. The Tata Project, India won the contract by bidding the lowest in the international tender called by the NEA.

The projects to be implemented through NEA Project Management Directorate have been divided into five sections.