Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, June 26: Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, who is arriving on July 4 to throw open Udhampur-Katra Railway Line, will also inaugurate 240 Mega Watts Uri-II Hydroelectric Project in North Kashmir’s Baramulla district.
This is one of the seven projects in the State undertaken by the Government of India under Prime Minister’s Reconstruc-tion Plan (PMRP) and has been completed despite facing challenging weather, geological and other hostile conditions.
Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah, who met the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi on June 20, had also urged him to inaugurate Uri-II Hydroelec-tric Project during his first visit to Jammu and Kashmir after becoming the Prime Minister.
During the meeting, Mr Omar, who is also holding the power portfolio, had also explained the Prime Minister about the importance of Uri-II power project for Jammu and Kashmir.
Authoritative sources told EXCELSIOR that National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC), which has executed the project, has received intimation from the PMO that Prime Minister, Narendra Modi would also inaugurate Uri-II Hydroelectric Project in Baramulla district during his visit to Jammu and Kashmir on July 4.
The project, second on river Jhelum in Uri town, is located downstream of 480 Mega Watt Uri-I. While the electro-mechanical part of the project was implemented by Alstom Ltd, the civil works were executed by the Hindustan Construction Company, sources said, adding the project having four units of 60 Mega Watts each has been designed to generate 1124 million units of electricity in a 90% dependable year.
The four units were commissioned in phases with Unit No. 1 and Unit No. 3 synchronised in September 2013, Unit 2 in November 2013 and Unit 4 in February 2014. “The work was carried out on target despite limited water availability during commissioning and other challenges in terms of a difficult terrain”, sources said.
Construction of the 337 meter long diversion tunnel of 8.8m diameter to channelise the river for facilitating the dam construction was completed by the beginning of 2007. The dam structure involving 100,000 cubic metres of concrete was completed in March 2011 and the construction of the power house and switchyard as well as key tunnelling works were carried out thereafter.
They said that the project has concrete gravity dam of 52 meter height and 157 meter length with 4 spillways of 9 meter each. The Head Race Tunnel of the project is 4.235 kilometer long while as the powerhouse of the project is underground and is connected to the dam by a tunnel. The power from the project will be evacuated through two lines—Uri-II-Wagoora and Uri-II-Uri-I.
With the commissioning of this project, the total installed capacity of NHPC Power Stations in Jammu and Kashmir will go up by 240 Mega Watts. The other projects of NHPC in Jammu and Kashmir are 690-MW Salal, 480-MW Uri-I, 390-MW Dulhasti and 120-MW Sewa-II. The Corporation has also made operational 45-MW Chutak in Kargil and 44-MW Nimo Bazgo in Leh.
When contacted, an officer of the NHPC associated with the Uri-II project told EXCELSIOR on the condition of anonymity that they faced many hurdles in the execution of the project due to weather vagaries and protests from the local people.
“However, the delay caused by earthquake and frequent flooding of River Jhelum was overcome and finally the project was completed within stipulated time-frame”, he said while disclosing that rock support methods involving wire mesh, steel rib, rock bolt and rock anchor were used for the tunnelling work in adverse geological conditions.
According to the local people, the NHPC violated the agreement vis-à-vis employment to the locals and commitments made under the Corporate Social Responsibility and this was the main reason behind their frequent protests against the NHPC.
However, the NHPC claimed that it has done a lot of social developmental works under Corporate Social Responsibility & Sustainable Development (CSR & SD) in the field of Education, Health, Peripheral Development, Skill Development, Vocational Training and Environment Sustainability.
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