Heralding the arrival of ‘Urja Ganga’ in Varanasi, the Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, laid the foundation-stone on October 24 of the City Gas Distribution (CGD) project at a function here in the presence of the Uttar Pradesh Governor, Mr. Ram Naik, the Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Mr. Dharmendra Pradhan, and the Union Minister of State for Communications and the Minister of State for Railways, Mr. Manoj Sinha.
The foundation laying heralds the start of construction of the CGD project which will bring eco-friendly fuel natural gas to households, vehicles and industries in the holy city of Varanasi. The project is part of GAIL (India) Ltd.’s Jagdishpur-Haldia and Bokaro-Dhamra Pipeline project (JHBDPL), popularly known as ‘Urja Ganga’.
The project, with an estimated capital investment of Rs. 1,000 crores, is expected to connect 50,000 households with piped natural gas (PNG) and provide compressed natural gas (CNG) to 20,000 vehicles through 20 CNG stations. About 800 km of steel and medium density polyethylene (MDPE) will be laid in the city as part of the project. With the CGD project, it will be possible to give five lakh LPG connections to households in rural areas.
The 2,540 km JHBDPL project is being executed at an investment of Rs. 12,940 crores, which includes 40 per cent capital grant (Rs. 5,176 crores) from the Union Government. It will pass through five States, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal, covering 40 districts.
GAIL has also been entrusted with developing the CGD network in seven cities en route the pipeline – Varanasi, Patna, Jamshedpur, Kolkata, Ranchi, Bhubaneswar and Cuttack.