AGARTALA, December 1 (TIWN): ONGC Tripura Power Company Limited (OTPC) was established to take advantage of huge natural gas reserves of Tripura and address power generation scenario of North East India. OTPC site is connected by a state highway to Udaipur with onward connectivity to Agartala by NH-44.

From this power plant Assam gets the maximum share of 240 MW of electricity followed by Tripura (196 MW), Meghalaya (79 MW), Manipur (42 MW), Nagaland (27 MW), Mizoram (22 MW) and Arunachal Pradesh (22 MW), while Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services (IL & FS) and ONGC Tripura Power Company (OTPC) keep 98 MW.

Former ONGC CMD Late SubirRaha took the initiative to set up a gas based thermal power station in Tripura. And accordingly on 29th September 2005 the then Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh laid the Foundation stone of this 726.6mw thermal power plant. OTPC is sponsored by ONGC, Insfrastructure Leading & Financial Services Ltd(IL&FS) and Govt of Tripura(GoT) for implementation of 726.6mw Combined Cycle Gas Turbine(CCGT) thermal power plant at Palatana to supply power to the power deficit states of North Eastern region of the country. On 16th September 2008, ONGC, IL&FS, GoT have agreed into a Shareholders' Agreement(SHA). Now ONGC has 50% share along with IL&FS 26%  GoT 0.5% and Residual Equity 23.5%. After some initial hazards the  Unit-I of this Rs 10,000 crore mega power plant, the largest in the NE region, began its Commercial Generation(CoG) on ,21 June 2013 when Pranab Mukherjee inaugurated CoG. And On Monday the Unit-II too will be dedicated to the nation by PM Narendra Modi.