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Module
5 Table 10: Policy mix directed at the issue (2002)

9-12 December, 2013 Category Policies
Subsidized rural electricity tarifs
Economic
Subsidized loans under the Accelerated Rural
Electrification Programme, REC, etc.

Various central government schemes, e.g., The Minimum
Expenditure
Needs Programme, the Kutir Jyoti Programme, the Prime

Tariff Orders of State Electricity Regulatory
Regulatory Minister’s Gramodaya Yojana
Commissions
Institutional The Rural Electrification Corporation

Performance Criteria: The Government of India target is 100 per cent electrification by 2012.
Of the balance, the Tenth Plan proposes to cover all 62 000 villages that can be electrified
through grid extension. The remaining 18 000 remote villages are to be electrified by 2011–
12 through the use of non-conventional technologies (MoF 2002-03).

Analysis: Only 44 per cent of rural households have access to electricity, compared to 88 per

cent of urban households. Out of the 597 258 inhabited villages in the country, about 80 000
are yet to be electrified, going by the current definition of village electrification. 32 Ten states
have declared 100 per cent electrification of their villages (Tenth Five-Year Plan).

As indicated in the gauge, there is a high level of implementation of policies directed at the
provision of electricity access in rural areas. Policies have mostly relied on subsidized tariffs

and government-sponsored electrification schemes. Progress is, however, not as encouraging
as indicated by the low level of access. Though statistics show that 86 per cent villages are
“electrified,” available data indicates that only 44 per cent of the rural households have access
to electricity. There are thus inadequacies in the current definition of village electrification
itself, which needs to be changed so that a village is considered electrified only if a minimum
number of households in that village are provided with electricity connections (Tenth Five-
Year Plan).

96 Integrated Analysis of Environmental Trends and Policies