NEW DELHI, April 9 ? Even as the country entered 55th year of its independence, rural electrification in the North-east is likely to remain a distant dream for a majority of the rural folks, as flow of funds has been drastically cut in the wake of the serious resources crunch faced by the States. Even as the north eastern State Governments continue to suffer silently, a Parliamentary Committee stunned by the disparity in allocation of funds to the North-east as compared to the rest of the country has directed the Power Ministry to convene a meeting of the north eastern State Governments for consultations to relax the norms of sanction of loans for rural electrification schemes.
What perhaps left the Parliamentary Committee bewildered was the pattern of allocation of funds by the Rural Electrification Corporation (REC). For instance, in the last five years the seven north eastern States have drawn a meagre Rs 171.83 crore while all the other States during the same period have drawn a whopping Rs 2,339.15 crore. The discrimination in allocation continues in other schemes including pump set energisation and system improvement as well. In all of last five years no new sanctions were ordered for pump set energisation whereas others States withdrew funds to the tune of Rs 1,084.94 crore.
Further the north eastern States had to make do with an allocation of Rs 129.41 crore for systems improvement in the last five years, as against an allocation of Rs 7,340.56 crore made to other States. The Parliamentary Committee on Public Undertaking under the chairmanship of Vijay Kumar Malhotra in its report has taken a serious note of the lop sided allotment of funds suggesting that Government should examine the phenomenon with adequate seriousness so that the root causes for this poor off-take of funds are identified and suitable measures are taken. ?The off-take of funds in the north eastern region for the rural electrification programmes is highly unsatisfactory, given the fact that the entire North-east is completely a rural area with highly inaccessible hilly terrain all over, which requires huge investments in the creation of a power distribution network?, the committee noted.
Recommending rectification, the Committee has suggested that the terms and conditions for the REC loans should be made softer in favour of the north eastern States and the norms prescribed for sanction of loans should be suitably reviewed and relaxed keeping in view the vast inaccessible terrain conditions and the lower density of population inhabiting a unit area in the whole region. The Committee directed that a meeting with all the north eastern States be convened urgently for consultation in matter of defining of norms and other connected issues including intensifying of the rural electrification in the region. The Committee has felt that this is an essential step, which is required to further reinforce the integrity of the country by ensuring the economic development of the North-east, which is possible only by proper energisation of the area, the report said.
Significantly, another Parliamentary Committee that of attached to the Power Ministry has also expressed its dismay over the rural electrification programme in the region. The Committee is constrained to note that in spite of Rs 54.84 crore allocated during 2001-2002 under Minimum Needs Programme (MNP) for village electrification, Rs 8.74 crore disbursed by REC and Rs 12.38 crore released by Ministry of Power under Non-lapsable Central Pool resources, no progress of work regarding rural electrification and pump energisation took place in any of the north eastern States.
In response, the Power Ministry said that during 2000-2001, 54 villages have been electrified under REC in the States of Arunachal Pradesh (35), Nagaland (16) and Tripura (three). Rural electrification is primarily the responsibility of the State Government who own and operate the distribution system in the State, the Power Ministry said, shifting the blame on the States. Assam for instance was given a target of 40 villages for electrification in 1992-2000 and is achievement was nil. Interestingly in the next financial year the State was given a target of electrifying 400 villages. However, latest figures were not available with the Power Ministry. In Assam, according to 1991 census there are 24,685 villages, of which 19019 have been electrified till 1999.