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The minister of power and renewable energy Mr. Ranjith Siyambalapitiya emphasized participating the Ratama Eliyai, Adura Duralai (A brighter country – banishing darkness) National Electrifying programme
Sampur coal power plant project will be accelerated

“By now we have provided 97% of the electricity demand of the households in Sri Lanka. As a whole, there are about 200,000 houses in the country which are not having electricity. Some house are situated closer to electric posts but doesn’t have electricity. How many school children are staying in these houses? About 6-7% school children in the country are still studying using kerosene lamps. By the January 2016 none of the school children should study using kerosene lamps. We are initiating this program today to provide electricity to every household with the leadership of the His Excellency President.” affirmed Mr.Thilak Siyambalapitiya, the minister of power and renewable energy. He made this comments participationg at the inauguration of the awareness session of the national electrification programme “Ratama Eliyai, Adura Duralai” (A brighter country – banishing darkness) held at the Divisional Secratariet office of Polonaruwa. Under this program those low income households, who have not yet taken elecricity for their houses will be offered a concessionary basis within next three months.

Under this scheme the households who are not having electricity will be identified from the village level through the information provided respectively by the grama niladari dividions, divisional secretariet, district secretariets and the ministry of internal affaires. A soft loan of Rs.40,000 will be provided to those households to get the electricity and to wire the house with a 7% annual interest rate to be paid in six years with 72 installments. No gurantee deposit will be required for this loan.
Minister Siyambalapitiya further added . . . ,

“By now there is a loan scheme that provides Rs.30,000 that is being maintained under the “Ministry of Samurdhi”. Other than that there is a loan of Rs. 40,000 which will be provided under the Asian Development Bank’s financial aid scheme. The speciality of this loan scheme is its allocation for wiring the house. People can payoff this loan with 72 installments without difficulty with their electricity bills itself. In the meantime the Ceylon Electricity Board is expected to provide the technical assistance to those who are getting the electricity. Also we are expecting to make people aware of these loan schemes through mobile awareness services.

Some people are saying that the first stage of the Sampur coal power plant project is getting dalayed. But the committee report is being prepared by this time with the leadership of the deputy minister. The project will be accelerated after forwarding the report to the cabinet. At the same time our attention is being paid on several aspects such as the second stage of the Sampur coal power plant, development of the renewable energy sector and improvement of the efficiency of electricity supply.

As the initial stage of this program several steps will be taken to extend the electricity connections to 9762 families those who have not taken the electricity connection yet. There were 2299 families those are identified to provide electricity and steps will be taken to provide electricity to them under this loan scheme.
Under this scheme the applicant should forward the duely filled up application form with the relevant documents to the CEB customer service centre. The ministry of power and renewable energy had implemented an efficient service to provide the electricity connection within a short period of 2 days.

Deputy minister of the power and renewable energy Attoney at Law Mr.Ajith P Perera, Mr.Peshala Jayarathna the Chief Minister of North Central Province, Districe secretary Mr.S.Senanayake, the secretary to the ministry, Dr.Suren Batagoda, Chairman of the Ceylon Electricity Board Mr.Anura Wijepala including the Deputy General Manager of the CEB and other senior officials, Provincial secretaries and Grama Niladharies participated the occasion.