Did you know? Household electrification is lowest in Jharkhand (42.4 per cent), Odisha (33 per cent) and Uttar Pradesh (37.06 per cent), with the latter alone accounting for 14.6 million households without electricity access.On April 28, when Leisang, a tiny hamlet in Manipur, was connected to the grid, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted that it would be "remembered as a historic day in the development journey of India" as India has achieved 100 per cent electrification. What he forgot to mention is the fact that there are more than 32 million households in the country
that are yet to be electrified. They are still in the dark.
We have certainly not achieved universal access to energy, but how far are we from it?
The government has said that every rural household in the country will have electricity by the end of 2019. As per data available on the official website of Saubhagya Yojna, on an average 22,300 households are electrified per day. It means, between May 2018 and December 2019, the government has to electrify 64,582 households every day.
100 per cent electrification still a distant dream
Did you know? Household electrification is lowest in Jharkhand (42.4 per cent), Odisha (33 per cent) and Uttar Pradesh (37.06 per cent), with the latter alone accounting for 14.6 million households without electricity access.
Will Indian dream come true
PM Narendra Modi launched the
Rs 16,320-crore Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana or Saubhagya scheme on September 25, 2017 to ensure last-mile connectivity to willing households to help achieve the goal of giving every household the access to electricity by December 31, 2018. It had a target to complete the electrification of 32,291,172 unelectrified houses by Dec 2018.
What World bank report says
Roughly 1 billion people in the world live without electricity. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia continue to have the largest access-deficit. About 80 per cent of those without access to electricity live in top 20 largest access-deficit countries whose progress has a major influence on global outcomes.
According to a global report, if current population trends continue and progress on electrification remains unequal, about 674 million people will continue to live without electricity in 2030.
Did you know? While nearly 1 billion people in Sub-Saharan Africa alone may gain electricity access by 2040, an estimated 530 million will still not have electricity access
India's expanding economy and population put it on the track to be the biggest driver of global energy demand through 2040, the Paris-based International Energy Agency said in a report on the country in 2015. Its grid connections are growing by 5 percent a year, a development that, along with rising incomes, means its power system needs to quadruple in size by 2040 just to to keep pace.
Path to 100 per cent electrificationNote: A village is declared electrified if 10 per cent of the households are given electricity along with public places such as schools, panchayat office, health centres, dispensaries and community centres.
✸ Data source: Official website of Saubhagya Yojna
✸ Data source: Official website of Garv Dashboard
✸ Data source: World Bank, 2018
✸ Data source: Tracking SDG7: The Energy Progress Report, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/ The World Bank, 2018
✸ Data source: Ministry of Power, Govt of India, 2018
✸ Data source: Census of India, 2011
✸ Data source: Standing committee on energy (2017-18), Sixteenth Lok Sabha
✸ Data source:
IEA, Energy Access Outlook 2017
