Gramin Ujala Yojana to start next month, 60 crore led bulbs to be distributed in villages

Public Sector Energy Efficiency Services Ltd. (EESL) next month will launch a new program called Rural Ujala from rural areas of five cities of the country including Prime Minister Narendra Modi's parliamentary constituency Varanasi.

This scheme is being launched with an intention to bring energy efficiency to the villages and increase the savings of the people living there through reduction in electricity bill. Under this scheme, to be implemented in a phased manner, three to four bulbs will provided to 10-20 crore families at the rate of Rs. 10 per LED.

A source associated with the scheme said, "The program called Grameen Ujala Yojana can be started from the second week of January 2021 next month. Under this, there are plans to distribute 60 crore LED bulbs to about 15 to 20 crore rural households. "

The source said that the scheme will be implemented in a phased manner. It will initially be implemented in rural areas of Varanasi (Parliamentary constituency of the Prime Minister) in Uttar Pradesh, Ara in Bihar, Nagpur in Maharashtra, Vadnagar in Gujarat and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh. he said

NTPC, a joint venture company of PFC, REC and Powergrid… Under the Ujala program that comes in ministry of power, has just distributed more than 36.50 crore LED bulbs at the rate of Rs 70 per bulb, but only 20 percent of them have been distributed in rural areas

This scheme is estimated to save around Rs 50,000 crore annually as energy savings. The source said, "This will save people money in the form of electricity bill, while promoting a sustainable and better life. Also, investment will increase as demand for LED bulbs increases. "

No subsidy will be taken from the Center or the states for this program and whatever expenses will be incurred by EESL itself. We will recover costs through carbon trading.