Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana: Objectives, Benefits & Impact

One of the main needs for the growth of rural areas is a proper electricity supply. However, many villages do not have enough power supply, and this impacts farming, business, school, hospital and daily life. To address this issue, the Indian government launched the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY) in 2014. The scheme targets to supply 24x7 electricity to every village to improve power infrastructure that support rural development overall,this article is guide to understanding this scheme it elaborate on its main objectives, works under fulfilment of the scheme, benefits, main achievement and impact, other schemes related to electricity and one success story of a district to show how this scheme contributed towards the electricity supply.

Background of DDUGJY

The Government introduced Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana to provide a proper power supply for every rural area. Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, has launched this scheme in November 2014. The government announced that it would electrify 18,452 villages in 1000 days till 1st May 2018. Under this scheme, the government has allocated Rs 756 billion for rural electrification. The scheme is a key programme of the Ministry of Power and works to provide a 24/7 electricity supply in rural areas. This scheme replaces the old Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran Yojana (RGGVY) and other programmes, which faced a lot of challenges like costly grid extension, limited electricity supply, high maintenance costs, difficult reach of many villages and low coverage of electricity in Eastern India. The important parts of RGGVY are now included in DDUGJY, and any unspent money from RGGVY has been added to Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY)

What are the key objectives of DDUGJY?

To provide electricity to all the villages
Separation of feeders to ensure power to farmers and a regular supply to other consumers
Improving and growing the rural area sub-transmission and distribution infrastructure network for electricity supply to improve the quality and trust
To install meters at all levels to reduce power loss

Scope of work to fulfil key objectives

The project under the scheme will be for rural areas only and include work as follows:

Separation of agriculture and non-agriculture feeders: This helps in managing the electricity supply better between agriculture and non-agriculture feeders The work includes the physical separation and virtual separation of feeders, in this a new high tension power lines need to be built and changes in the old routes to create separate feeders, new distribution system need to be installed and also distribution low tension lines need to be moved to group agricultural and non-agricultural consumers separately and rotary switches and related equipment need to be installed at substations to manage the separation.
‍Improving sub-transmission and distribution system: It includes work like improving the power system in rural areas by building new substations with 66 KV, 33 KV, 22 KV, or 11 KV lines, upgrading old substations and transformers, adding capacitors for high power quality, high voltage distribution system improve the reliability and usage of aerial bundled cables in areas prone to theft
‍Micro and off-grid power supply system: Setting up a small independent power system in remote rural areas when the main grid is down or not connected
‍Metering: It helps to track and audit electric use. It includes work such as installing proper digital or static meters at substations, feeders, distribution transformers, and all consumers without meters. It covers replacing old, faulty, or mechanical meters, and installing pillar boxes outside consumer premises to hold meters, along with needed services cables and accessories

Benefits of the DDUGJY Scheme

The major benefits of this scheme is that all villages and household get electricity which lead to increase in agriculture yield and increasing growth of small business and household enterprise by creating new job opportunities and major improvement in growth of sectors like health, education, and banking services like ATMs and people get better access to radio, telephone, television, internet, and mobile services. It also improves social security. Schools, panchayats, hospitals and police stations also get electricity and rural areas get more chances for overall development

Key Achievements and Impact of the DDUGJY Scheme

The time duration given by the Ministry of Power for completing all the work was till December 31, 2021 and work in the project has been completed. According to a government report, A total of 1365 projects worth Rs 66,380 were approved under the rural electrification re-program and the Government of India gave Rs 53,414 crores to the States for these projects. Below is a list of works which were completed as of December 31, 2021.

1. Electricity access: All the unelectrified villages were given electricity, which was around 18,374 unelectrified villages, and a total of 1,27,68,620 households were given electricity by April 2018

2. Building substations and power lines: Under a new set of projects under DDUGJY. A total of 3,958 substations, including 2,093 (upgraded substations), were commissioned. 1.23 Lakh ckm of new 11 KV lines,3.95 distribution transformers and 0.28 Lakh Ckm of HT lines (33& 66 KV),2.96 lakh Ckm of LT lines were installed for a stronger power network in rural areas.

3. Separation of agricultural and non-agricultural supply: A total of 1.22 Lakh Ckms of 11Kv feeders were separated, which delivered a fair distribution of power supply to farmers as well as households.

4. Additional Infrastructure support: Under the DDUGJY Scheme, the government of India had approved Rs 14,179 crores to help 20 states build extra power infrastructure, which was covered under the Saubhagya scheme.

Other electricity access schemes in India

Below are listed some schemes other than Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana for electricity access in India, with key objectives.

Scheme	Key objective
Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana (Saubhagya), 2017	To achieve universal household electrification by bringing electricity connection to the non-electrified households in rural and poor urban areas
Integrated Power Development Scheme (IPDS), 2014	To achieve a 24x7 power supply, reduce aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses according to the target, and ensure every household has access to electricity
Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme (RDSS), 2021	Aim to help DISCOMs work better with modern technology and stay financially strong, provide affordable, quality electricity to all, including remote areas
Pradhan Mantri Surya Ghar Muft Bijli Yojana,2024	Aim to provide free electricity to households, it also gives a subsidy to install solar panels, the subsidy covers 40% of its cost

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Success story of the DDUGJY scheme

There are success stories of many areas which got proper electricity supply under this scheme. One example is Barwani, a tribal district in Madhya Pradesh. Below is a breakdown of the problem it faced before, the solution provided by this scheme and the impact after

Problem: As of 1st April 2015, it had 41 villages without and over 13,700 BPL households without any electricity

Solution provided under this scheme: Villages were electrified by extending 11 KV lines from nearby substations and using LT cables up to the village street. Many villages were situated in forest areas and needed forest clearance to install lines, so DISCOM worked with the forest department for clearances. RS joists and H-beams were used in hilly areas, and poles were carried by boats and hand carts. A 24/7 call centre and problem register at the village were installed to fix faulty meters in 6 hours and transformers in 2 days

Impact: LED streetlights were installed, and every BPL household received two free LED bulbs and 40 villages and 11,785 BPL households got electricity, 155 BPL households were provided with connections and the power supply became nearly 24 hours.

Conclusion

The Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY) has helped bring electricity to thousand of households, it improved power system and made electricity more reliable and helped people in village to get better access of education, health service and small business, now many village and tribal areas have 24x7 electricity due to microgrids, new power lines, digital meters and there are other government schemes which aim to ensure proper electricity supply across country

FAQs

‍1. What are the elements of the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana?

The components of this scheme are separating agricultural and non-agricultural feeders to provide better electricity supply, improving the sub-transmission and distribution system in rural areas,including installing meters for transformers, feeders, and consumers, and setting up microgrid and off-grid power systems and completing projects under RGGVY.

2. How much funding is required for the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana?

The scheme needs a total investment is Rs. 43,033 crore, out of which the Government of India provides Rs. 33,453 crore as budget support for it

3. What is the role of DISCOM in electricity supply?

It stands for distribution company, they are companies that deliver electricity; they do not produce electricity themselves, but buy power from power producers and sell it to people

4. What are the uses of Micro and off-grid power supply systems?

A microgrid is a small , sufficient energy system that uses solar panels, batteries, and sometimes diesel generators to provide power for a specific place or community, whereas off-grid means generating and storing all your own electricity on site without connection to the national power grid, making yourself fully independent.