The Modi Government is set to achieve its target of electrifying all villages by May this year and provide electricity to each household by 2019, Union Power Minister RK Singh said on Monday.
Spelling out the Government’s priorities in the power sector, the Minister said as of now only 935 villages remain to be electrified and that will be done in the next couple of months.
“The Government is equally committed to electrifying each household by March 2019 and achieving 24X7 power supply.”
Singh said electrification would imply that billing process has been made effective in the particular village or household. He said most un-electrified States include UP, Bihar, West Bengal, MP, Odisha, Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Punjab.
The Government has said the pre-paid model to be adopted for electricity to all households as per Government plans.
The Minister said out of the 18,450 villages without electricity, more than 17,515 villages had been given power supply as on date. He said the “Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana”, also called “Saubhagya”, was a move towards this goal and that about 4 crore households would benefit from it.
Under this scheme, all un-electrified households in rural as well as urban areas were eligible, said Singh, adding that non-poor households would have to pay Rs 500 in ten equal instalments along with their electricity bill every month.
Under ‘Saubhagya’ scheme launched on October 11, 2017, 29.36 lakh households have already been electrified.
The Minister said the Government is working out a programme where electricity is the right of every citizen in the country.