Aurangabad: The work of laying underground power cable network in the city as part of the central government scheme — moving at snail’s pace till now owing to differences between the civic body and state power utility — is likely to gather momentum with both warring parties reaching to an accord.In a meeting held on Thursday, the Aurangabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) and Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Limited (MSEDCL) agreed to follow the Nagpur pattern as per which the latter will not have to pay any digging charges to the civic body, but will have to repair the roads on its own.The Integrated Power Development Scheme (IPDS), a special initiative by the Centre that aims to strengthen the electricity network in urban areas, was launched in the city in October 2017. But it could not see satisfactory progress due to differences between AMC and MSEDCL.The scheme having a financial layout of Rs111 crore has deadline of March for accomplishing different work. The MSEDCL’s Aurangabad zone chief engineer Suresh Ganeshkar on Thursday said the state power utility would have to only pay supervision charges towards the local civic body while executing works under the IPDS.“Actual work could not begin for more than nine months due to differences over digging charges. The work somehow could get started later, but again came to a standstill due to allegations of use of heavy machinery for digging of roads and further issues related to higher digging charges,” he said.During Thursday’s meeting it was decided that the state power utility will itself repair the roads dug for implementation of the IPDS. “Similar pattern is followed in the Nagpur. We will be paying money in the rage of Rs75 to Rs100 per meter to the local civic body towards supervision charges, depending on the type of road,” Ganeshkar said.The work of laying underground power cable assumes significance considering the large presence of overhead high-tension and low-tension electricity cables hanging at low heights in many parts of the city.As announced earlier by MSEDCL authorities, high voltage power cable of around 15-kilometre length and low voltage cable of nearly 419-kilometre would be laid in Aurangabad as a part of action plan for the Smart City project.“We tried to convince the civic officials that the IPDS was taking load off from them of the proposed work related to the Smart City project. As Nagpur pattern is in place now, we hope no more roadblocks in executing the scheme within stipulated deadline,” Ganeshkar said.Besides the underground power cable, the central scheme will also witness commissioning of total six power sub-stations in different parts of the city.

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