The Indian government has offered the construction of Lower Arun hydropower project in Nepal to the Nepali government on Wednesday with a capacity of about 400 megawatts.
According to ANI news reports, State-run Rashtriya Samachar Samiti (RSS) reported: “In a meeting with Minister for Energy, Water resources and irrigation Barshaman Pun at New Delhi on Monday, Indian Minister of State for Power Raj Kumar Singh put forth a proposal that the new project can be developed adopting the same model of 900-MW Arun III project.”
The agency quoted minister Pun as saying: “A proposal has been made from Indian side to develop the Lower Arun on the same model being adopted by Indian company while constructing the Arun III. Nepal has put its stance for further discussion observing the progress on the construction of Arun III.”
Pun further noted that the Nepali authorities would come up with and make a proper decision over whether or not to assign the construction of lower Arun to the Indian authorities after noting the progress made during in Arun III hydro project.
In order to participate in the International Sustainable Development Conference, reports said Pun has arrived in New Delhi on Monday when the conference began.
It may be further noted that as per the directive of the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), the Nepal Energy Ministry had scrapped out the license of the Lower Arun project, when it was noted that the Brazilian Company “Brass Power” has failed to perform that according to the conditions which were imposed in the license.
Since the license was awarded to the Brazilian company, it did not have made any progress over the project from the last 15 years.
According to the reports, the project investment is estimated worth more than Rs 100 billion. The Nepal Energy ministry has estimated, if the project has been designed in a way to export power to India, the project would worth about 1000 MW capacity.
The Department of Electricity Development is on its way to carry out the project feasibility and detail the study. The Indian government has put forth the offer to construct the Lower Arun project in Nepal by keeping condition stipulated in Arun III.