In Banjerpally village, located in Siddipet mandal, around 150 km from the district headquarters and close to Kaimnagar, R. Shankar is a happy resident and like him other villagers also.

Reason being, for the past three months, they have been paying between Rs. 100 and Rs. 120 towards the power bills in spite of using all electrical gadgets such as TV, fridge, lights and fans. Some of them also use single phase motors to pump water.

Thanks to the solar initiative taken by Irrigation Minister T. Harish Rao.

The village has 121 houses and as many as 95 households got the solar power connections.

Meanwhile, for the rest who lost the chance to set up solar power connections in their houses on the Central government’s subsidy, the district administrators have been trying to provide with alternatives.

The total cost of the solar power system for each house was Rs. 85,000 whereas each beneficiary had paid an amount Rs. 8,500 (ten per cent of the total project cost) as their contribution, while the remaining amount was subsidy from the government.

This is part of bigger plan that was in store for the village to transform it as complete solar village, if possible seeing that without poles.

Once all the house were connected with solar power, the second phase of work for solar street lights would commence for which while the State government will provide a fund of Rs. 5 lakh as its contribution followed Rs. 5 lakh from NABARD.

In the final phase, solar power would be supplied to run bore wells in the village if farmers come forward.

“The second phase work will be commenced in next month. We are trying to exhibit a picture to the world on how we can depend on nature for our energy requirements,” G. Ramesh Kumar, AGM, NABARD, told The Hindu .

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> National> Telangana / by R. Avadhani / Banjerpally (Medak District) / October 13th, 2015