About 25% of 18,452 unelectrified villages got power since August

NEW DELHI: Government has electrified almost one fourth of 18,452 unelectrified villages since Prime Minister Narendra Modi's announcement in his Independence Day speech last year that these areas will be provided power within 1,000 days.

As many as 4,319 villages have been electrified so far which constitute over 23 per cent of the targetted 18,452 villages to be provided power by government, as per the information updated on Centre's Garv portal which provides details in this regard.

The process to electrify 940 other villages is on. Besides 1,457 villages are under energisation.

Garv also states that the electrification work is yet to be started in as many as 11,736 villages.

Earlier in the day, the Power Ministry said in a statement that it has electrified 276 villages across the country last week (January 11 to 17, 2016) under Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojna ( DDUGJY).

Out of these electrified villages, 139 villages are in Assam, 25 villages in Bihar), 21 - Jharkhand, 60 - Odisha, 30 - Uttar Pradesh and one village in Rajasthan.

The Centre has decided to provide power to 18,452 villages by May 1, 2018. The project has been taken up on mission mode and strategy for electrification consists of squeezed implementation schedule of 12 months with 12 Stage milestones for village electrification monitoring with defined timelines.