Govt to use mobile app for on-the-spot power connections

The government will use a mobile phone application to register and complete the documentation of 4 crore unelectrified households to provide on-the-spot power connections under the Saubhagya scheme.
The exercise will be conducted under the Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana (Saubhagya), stated a report submitted to the NITI Aayog by Power Secretary A K Bhalla.
Earlier in September last year, the government had launched the scheme to provide electricity connections to 4 crore households by March 31, 2019.
According to the report, the government will prioritise on the basis of infrastructure and unelectrified households in different areas.
It has also decided on monitoring and reporting through dedicated web portal/mobile application to achieve highest level of efficacy.

The report states that government will have a focused approach to achieve its target under the scheme because 90 per cent of unelectrified households are in seven states -- Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.

It said that 80 per cent of task was concentrated in about 200 districts -- Uttar Pradesh (65), Bihar (33), Madhya Pradesh (30), Odisha (20), Jharkhand (19), Assam (15), Rajasthan (8) and Telangana (3).
It also stated that as far as village electrification is concerned, the task is almost complete because the number of villages to be electrified will be 1,370 by May 1, 2018.

The government had identified 18,452 unelectrified villages as on April 1, 2015 out of which 15,981 have been electrified and 1,101 villages found uninhabited/in grazing reserves.