Minister launches app to track rural electrification

Aiming to provide access to electricity to all households in the country, the Minister of States (I/C) for Power, Coal, New & Renewable Energy and Mines, Piyush Goyal launched the ‘GARV-II’ app here on Tuesday. 

Under this module, village-wise and habilitation-wise base line data on household electrification for all states, as provided by them, has been incorporated. While explaining the features of ‘GARV-II’ app the minister said that, “The data in respect of about 6 lakh habitations having 17 crore people, has been mapped for tracking progress on household electrification in each of the habitations of these villages, which is a remarkable progress over the previous GARV app.” 

The government has already claimed that, in the earlier version of the ‘GARV’ app, launched in October, 2015 for the effective and efficient monitoring of village electrification program, the data of only 18, 452 un-electrified villages had been mapped and 12-stage milestone-based monitoring mechanism was put in place. 

Adding further, Mr. Goyal also mentioned that, “The status of village-wise works sanctioned under the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY) and release of funds to the states for these projects has also been mapped in ‘GARV-II’ to monitor progress of works in each village.” 

The progress is also required to be updated by the implementing agencies of the states on day to day basis. All data would be made available in public domain to ensure transparency, enhance accountability of various stakeholders and facilitate view near real time progress. The minister also urged the state governments to determine an average price for electricity connections for APL (Above Poverty Line) families across the state so that they can be given electricity connections through the option of paying by easy monthly installments.