The Batti Jalao Timeline:

05.06.2019, After 70 years the NOC for a water and electricity connection, was given to Naushacha Pada! But the struggle continues..

No Electricity in Mumbai in our 72nd  year of Indian Independence?

Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana Saubhagya ( meaning electricity in every home) is  a flagship scheme,  floated by the  PM of India, Shri Narendra Modi,  QUEST ( Quality Evaluation For Sustainable Transformation)  by Maharashtra CM Shri  Devendra Fadnavis, with special budgetary allocations for Tribals, was launched in April 2018, and  YET, within the City of Dreams & India’s Financial Capital MUMBAI CITY, we have households without electric connections!

Naushacha Pada is an old Adivasi village of Aarey Forest, now within the precincts of the Mumbai Veterinary college Goregaon East. As part of the  Swach Bharat & Open Defecation Free campaigns, I had arranged for Toilets for this village. On my visit there I  noticed that even though the village is a stone’s throw from the bustling Western Express Highway of Mumbai and in spite of there being a  tar road with street lights within touching distance of the Adivasi huts, the Adivasis have no electricity.

This glaring injustice shook me. Visits to the many other  Adivasi Villages of Aarey Forest showed the same pattern.  The Government quarters were electrified, whereas the indigenous Warli tribes, living in the Aarey forest for generations, were in the dark.

The 100-year-old Vanicha Pada has an unused electric substation set up 2 years ago,  yet today, the village has no electricity.

“We need a No Objection Certificate from the Government” is what Reliance Energy told me, as being the reason for not granting power connections to these villages.
~ Cassandra Nazareth