By Elton Gomes
On Sunday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted that all villages in India have been electrified. Modi said that the BJP-led Central government had “fulfilled a commitment due to which the lives of several Indians will be transformed forever.” The prime minister was “delighted that every single village of India now has access to electricity.”
Leisang, a village in Manipur, was reportedly the last village to be electrified on April 28. The government’s Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana scheme is considered to be a significant development for preparing India, in achieving universal electricity access, Live Mint reported.
By electrifying all villages, the government was able to meet the deadline set by Modi himself. And doing so might be a significant boost for BJP ahead of the 2019 general elections, according to a report by Business Today.
The report mentioned that as per records in government data, India’s 5,97,464 villages have been electrified. However, does electrification of villages mean that everyone has access to power? Does this mean that India is now finally free of its electricity woes?
Here’s what happened
In October 2016, the-then energy minister Piyush Goyal said that all villages would receive electricity connections by May 2017. The union minister had also announced soft loans to provide electricity connections to all households.
Courtesy of the government’s Saubhagya scheme, in September 2017, Modi promised to provide electricity to all households by the end of 2018. The scheme aimed to offer free electricity installations to low-income households. Emphasising the need for renewable energy, the government said that it would provide households with a solar direct current system doing away with expensive wiring.
The promise of 100% electrification has seemingly been fulfilled, and the news means a significant outcome to villages, particularly because India was completely electrified 12 days prior to the deadline.
However, can we take our government’s words at face value? Looking at the government’s criteria regarding electrification in villages is important in understanding how far this positively impacts Indian villagers.
Criteria for considering a village as electrified
Citing information from the government website, data.gov.in, DNA reports that a village is considered electrified if “the number of households electrified should be at least 10% of the total number of households in the village.” In other words, for a village to be considered as electrified, only 10% of its houses need to have electricity.
Additionally, a village is considered electrified, if it has basic electrical infrastructure, and electricity is offered in its schools, administrative offices, and health centres. The government’s criteria therefore falls short of ensuring that every household in every single village has access to electricity.
What the UPA did
Modi’s present statement should be looked at in light of the UPA government’s actions prior to 2014.
“Between 2005 and 2014, the UPA-I and UPA-II governments connected over 1,082,280 villages to the grid and connections were provided to over 20 million households, out of which 19 million were given free connections,” The Wire reported.
Media reports have stated that when Modi took office in 2014, roughly 18,000 villages were without electricity.
According to the Wire, “the UPA electrified 12,030 villages per year while the Modi government electrified 4,842.” However, what has to be taken into account is that a majority of the 18,000 villages were in “far-flung areas and remote locations.”
The Saubhagya scheme
The Modi government launched the Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana (Saubhagya) scheme in September 2017, and allocated Rs 16,000 crore towards boosting “infrastructure for last mile connectivity.” According to The Wire, the scheme looks to provide free electricity, but the supply will be metered and villagers will be billed for consumption.
As per another report in the Wire, villagers who prefer paying a fixed amount monthly for electricity are unlikely to take connections, and pay for consuming electricity.
Why you should care
Although the government seems to have reached a significant achievement, critical questions about its schemes, and policies remain unanswered. Why is it that villages are considered electrified only if 10% of houses have electricity?
A 2017 report in Quartz mentions that India was on it way to become a power-surplus nation. Why then is India still complaining of power shortage? If the current government wishes to remain in power, an important task will be to provide sufficient electricity to India’s rural areas, with adequate policies in place.