India Made 'Massive Gains' In Electricity Supply In Last Six Years, Brought Power Deficit Down To Nearly Nil In FY21: Govt

India has made massive gains in nationwide power supply in the last six years and reduced the power deficit down to nearly nil in the financial year 2020-21, the Centre said on Monday (8 November).

"India had a massive power deficit of -16.6 per cent in 2007-08. Even in 2011-12, it was -10.6 per cent," the Ministry of Power said in a statement on Monday.

"Through the multi pronged, comprehensive and aggressive interventions of the government, this deficit is near about wiped out, consistently over the last three years: - 0.4 per cent in 2020-21, - 0.7 per cent in 2019-20 and - 0.8 per cent in 2018-19," the ministry said.

"The current year, up till October, it has been -1.2 per cent; the marginal spike being attributable to the annual post monsoon pressure on power output. This is also likely to normalise by the end of the year," the ministry added.

The ministry further said that the transformation from an acutely power deficit country, to a situation of demand being met, except for an extremely marginal shortfall of less than 1 per cent, has been made possible by the several schemes "brought in by the current government to address the unhappy situation".

The schemes include Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY), which was launched in July 2015, for infrastructure push in the rural sector – setting up of transmission and sub transmission systems.

The Integrated Power Development Scheme ( IPDS ) was launched in November 2014 to fill in power infrastructure gaps in urban areas, the ministry said.

The Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana (Saubhagya) scheme launched in September 2017 with a vision to take electricity to every household (willing), and has been able to supply electricity connections to 2.8 to crore households which were hitherto in darkness, it added.

The ministry added that the augmentation to the installed power capacity in the country, consequent to these efforts, has been 1,55,377 megawatt in last seven years.