314 villages electrified last week: Government

A total of 314 villages in nine states were electrified during last week, ending March 6, under the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojna, an official statement said on Monday.

"Of these electrified villages, 93 villages are in Uttar Pradesh, 41 in Odisha, 40 in Assam, 40 in Chhattisgarh, 31 in Arunachal Pradesh, 30 in Jharkhand, 19 in Bihar, 16 in Madhya Pradesh and 4 in Rajasthan," said the power ministry statement, adding a total of 6156 villages have been electrified during 2015-16 till date.

The government has decided to electrify the remaining 18,452 un-electrified villages by May 1, 2018, it said.

"Out of the remaining 12,296 villages, 8,496 villages are to be electrified through grid, 3,312 villages through off-grid where grid solutions are out of reach due to geographical barriers and 488 villages are to be electrified by the state governments.

"The project has been taken 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," the statement added.