The pen, indeed, seems mightier than the sword. Just a change of definition, and more of rural India will now be lit up than was possible in the 50 years since Independence. It might sound strange, but semantics will now enable more villagers to experience the real benefits of 'power to all'.
Around 5,000 remote villages, which have not been electrified in the 52 years since Independence, will soon attain 60 per cent electrification of all households just because the government has now changed what defines village electrification. This is against a national average of 31 per cent of rural households electrified.
This happened after the power ministry and the Rural Electrification Commission (REC) informed the Planning Commission it would not be possible for them to electrify 18,000 villages, using the conventional methods of transmission and distribution. The reasons cited were the inhospitable terrain and the geographical distribution of the villages. Subsequently, when these remote villages were referred to the ministry of non-conventional energy sources (MNES), the ministry agreed, and proposed to change the definition of