Why states are finding Centre's call to power all homes by December tough

The country still has 31 mn homes without power; About 90% of these have to be electrified by non-special category states

The Union government recently announced its achievement of 100 per cent electrification of all villages before schedule. However, states, especially those in the non-special category, are saddled with a bigger worry to electrify all households by December 2018 as mandated in the Centre’s Saubhagya scheme.

The country still has 31.2 million un-electrified households. Of this, the special category states (SCS) have 3.3 million households to cover while the non-special category states will have to electrify the rest. The funding requirement for SCS households is pegged at Rs 45 billion. Such states would be granted 90 per cent of the funding