Solar light is the latest catchword amongst the humble rustic folk in villages of Palamu. Sources reveal that as the wait for electricity connection and water supply remain a distant dream, villagers who can afford are turning towards available solar lighting option.
Vishwanath Prajapati a resident of Mahogayain village under Panki police station has installed solar panel and a battery equipments. Prajapati said he had bought this from Panki bazaar. It costs him around `8,000. He said he and his family go to bed early at night to save solar light. Prajapati showed installed electricity poles sans overhead wires for years. He does not lament any more, but has concern for poor who cannot afford this expenditure to lit their houses with the help of the Sun light.
Hurlong is another village under Panki police station, which in the late eighties and for the whole of nineties was termed as ‘Jaffna’ of the then naxal outfit CPI Ml Party Unity. Sources said as Jaffna was the citadel of lTTE in Sri lanka then Hurlong was the red territory of Party Unity.
Hurlong village has no electricity since Independence days said a Khan family living there. Here, the affluent lot make up with solar panels for lighting their houses at night. The poor rely on dhibree. Kerosene oil is still much in demand in this village. One and a half kilometer away from Hurlong is another village Gogar, which was too christened as Bataclova, another stronghold of lTTE in Sri lanka in the late eighties and nineties. Here too there is no electricity.
At village Dhuma The Pioneer saw water supply being done with the help of six huge solar panels! A mathematics major student Chandan Kumar of Mazdoor Kissan Degree College Panki told The Pioneer at Dhuma village that solar driven water supply is the ‘jaan’ of the poor who wash their head with shampoo as is the only which works works too good in the available water supply!
This solar driven water supply is a totally shut down once the Sun sets in. Chandan Kumar showed a couple of water stand posts which supply water from the tank that is completly operational with the Sun light, huge battery and other accessories meant for powering it the solar way.
Interestingly, contestants in this panchayat poll promised water supply in their wards/ panchayats through solar system and the voters did not distrust them either, since Palamu people believe in Surya Shakti where scores of houses are lit at night by the Sun!