Government of India launched the Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana – Saubhagya in October, 2017 with the objective to achieve universal household electrification for providing electricity connections to all willing un-electrified households in rural areas and all willing poor households in urban areas in the country by March, 2019. All households were reported electrified by the States, except 18,734 households in Left Wing Extremists (LWE) affected areas of Chhattisgarh as on 31.03.2019. Subsequently, seven States namely Assam, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Manipur, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh had reported that around 19.09 lakh un-electrified households, identified before 31.03.2019, which were unwilling earlier but have expressed willingness to get electricity connection. All these seven States have reported 100% household’s electrification as on 31.03.2021. A total of 2.817 crore households have been electrified since the launch of Saubhagya, up to 31.03.2021.
To mitigate the liquidity problems in power sector due to low power consumption during the lockdown imposed due to COVID-19, Government of India announced a Liquidity Infusion Scheme as part of Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan on 13th May 2020. Under the scheme, Power Finance Corporation (PFC) Ltd. and REC Ltd. extended special long-term transition loans at concessional rates to Power Distribution Companies (DISCOMs) to clear their outstanding dues towards purchase of power from Central Public Sector Undertaking (CPSU) Generation (GENCO) & Transmission companies (TRANSCOs), Independent Power Producers (IPPs) and Renewable Energy (RE) generators, as existed on 30.06.2020. As on 30.06.2021, REC & PFC have sanctioned Rs 1,35,537 crore and disbursed Rs.79,678 crore respectively to States under Liquidity Infusion Scheme.
