The additional financing to the Fourth Power System Development Project (PSDP IV), which was approved by the World Bank on March 18 this year, will finance the completion of selected transmission schemes intended to expand transmission system and capacity.

“The power sector has improved significantly in recent years, but demand for electricity continues to outstrip supply,” said Julia Fraser, World Bank senior financial analyst.

“This project will help the government achieve its goal of expanding power generation capacity to more than 200 gigawatts (200,000 megawatts) by 2012 through enhancing the country’s power transmission capacity and enabling power to be transmitted across regions and states. It will also help reduce transmission losses and, subsequently, cut the cost of energy.”

The World Bank has been actively involved in the reform and development of the transmission sector in India, and specifically in the creation and strengthening of the Power Grid Corporation of India, the Bank said.

This is the fifth direct loan the Bank has made to Power Grid since 1993. During this period, the company has nearly tripled its transmission network, its assets have grown more than ten-fold to $8.9 billion, and revenues have increased more than eight times to $1.3 billion. Today, Power Grid is the world’s third largest transmission utility.

Despite a fast growing economy, India’s growth potential is constrained by inadequate electricity services and limited power generation and transmission infrastructure, the Bank said. Over forty percent of the population is without electricity, and the cost of erratic and insufficient power supply is high for industry as well as households.

When it comes to electrifying villages, Gujarat shows the light. The laggards include Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh.

The state has achieved 147 percent more than the target set under the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana (RGGVY), the rural electrification scheme of the government.

An internal audit of the centre’s ambitious scheme says Gujarat electrified 1,236 villages during the 2007-08 fiscal against the target of electrifying 500 villages.

What worries power ministry officials is the slow progress of RGGVY in states like Bihar, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Orissa, and Uttar Pradesh.

“In the last fiscal, Bihar electrified only 3,841 villages against the target of 6,000, while Chhattisgarh could meet only 15 percent of the target,” said an official in the power ministry, who did not want to be named.

The progress of RGGV scheme is regularly monitored by the ministry of statistics and programme implementation (S&PI), which has put Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Haryana, West Bengal and Uttarakhand in the group of best performing states led by Gujarat.

“The poor response from Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra where only one, 37, 219 villages respectively were electrified against the target of 805, 1,050, 303 may prove a bottleneck in meeting the national target under the RGGV scheme,” admitted the official.

The rural electrification scheme named after former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi envisages providing electricity to all households, electrifying around 115,000 unelectrified villages and giving connections to 234 million below the poverty line (BPL) households by 2009.

“Since the scheme was launched in April 2005, around 50,000 villages have been electrified till the last fiscal. The remaining villages have to be covered during the current fiscal,” an official in the ministry of S&PI told IANS, requesting anonymity.

The government has proposed to spend around Rs.55 billion on the execution of RGGVY in the current fiscal. The total estimated cost of the project is pegged at Rs.510 billion. It covers villages with a minimum population of 100 each.

India, Asia’s third largest economy, was faced with a power deficit of 73,050 million units during April 2007-March 2008.

The deficit of 73,050 million units was largely in Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura, and Uttar Pradesh.

Said a government official: “There is a need to augment the country’s power generation capacity to meet the growing demand.”

The government has estimated that India will require an installed capacity of over 200,000 MW by 2012 to meet the electricity demand, which will be 60 percent more than what the country has at present.

About 26 percent of India’s installed capacity for electricity generation is from hydropower, and around 66 percent from thermal generation, including gas.

By 2020, India will require 400,000 MW of electricity. Energy is going to be required in a large quantity in view of rapid economic growth.

*(OC (W) – 5; BC-A-1; BC-B-1; BC-B (W)-1; PH-1; PH(W)-1;ST-1.)

These vacancies are subject to variation at the time of recruitment based on the necessity.

% of reservation:

• BC-25% + 4% Muslim reservation subject to orders of Government from time to time.

• SC- 15%, ST-6%, PH-3%.

• 33 1/3 % reservation for women is applicable as per rules.

Applicants should obtain the APPLICATION (ICR) FORM from the sales counter of APTRANSCO/Vidyut Soudha/Khairathabad/Hyderabad-500 082 duly remitting of Rs.100/-(Rupees One hundred only) through a crossed Demand Draft drawn on any Nationalised Bank in favour of the Pay Officer / APTRANSCO / Vidyut Soudha / Hyderabad payable at Hyderabad.

By Post: Applicants should send Crossed Demand Draft for Rs.135/(Rupees One hundred and thirty five only) as mentioned above, and address to the CGM(HRD & Training)/APTRANSCO/Vidyut Soudha/Hyderabad (along with a requisition and a self addressed post card for acknowledgement) to obtain the same by Speed post.

a) Sale of ICR applications :: From 05-07-08 to 26-07-08
Timings :: 11AM to 4PM

b) Submission of ICR applications:: From05-07-08 to 04-08-08
Timings :: 11AM to 5PM

In the Notification, APtransco not mentioned eligibility, syllabus and selection process. Hope they will release it in a couple of days. As far as I know, first class engineering graduates in the selected discipline are eligible. Syllabus will be from B.Tech syllabus. Selection process is of twos stages. First one is written exam, in which objective questions we have to answer and selected candidates will be called for Group discussion/Interview.

APTransco Assistant Engineer Notification – July 2008 Download the Notification – PDF ( Size: 64KB )

Detailed notification includes selction process, marks and dates.Download APTransco AEs Detailed Notification 2008

Aptransco Website was changed to http://www.aptransco.gov.in

For more details see it on APtransco Careers page: Notification for AEs in Regular Basis

Notification details:

Vacancies:
Trainee assistant engineer: 261 (electrical+mech+civil)

Application form can be obtained by paying Rs.100/- in personal or paying Rs.135/- by IPO
from APgenco New Building, GTS Colony, Adjacent to Vengal Rao nagar, Hyderabad.

Important Dates:

Last date for sale of ICR form: August 13′ 2008

receiving filled application forms: July 28′ 2008 to August 23′ 2008

Download the syllabus in .doc format:SYLLABUS FOR THE COMPETETIVE TEST FOR THE RECRUITMENT OF ASSISTANT ENGINEERS (ELECTRICAL)

Exam will be of 2 hours duration with 100 multiple choice questions. No negative marking.

Other Info: Apgenco Website: http://www.apgenco.gov.in

For official notification see here: http://www.apgenco.gov.in/inner.asp?frm=viewcontents&filename=HomePgCategory.xml&Tagname=HP_Cat343&subhname=CareerOpportunities

Register yourself – get your own electrical blog and connect to other mates.