Throughout the district of Tharparkar, it’s hard to find any evidence that a government exists. Ghost schools are littered all through the desert while thousands of children remain unable to name a single letter of the Sindhi alphabet. Government health facilities lie in disrepair. People starve for water and fend for themselves any which way they can.

But there is a slight glimmer of hope.

In the Bharmal village, some 15 kilometers north east from the town of Chachro, an interesting experiment has brought great results. About a year ago, the government’s Alternative Energy Development Board, in collaboration with Thardeep Rural Development Program, an NGO, provided electricity to this village of 750 people.

The AEDB installed solar energy equipment in all 109 households in the village at a cost of a Rs 50,000 per household. This village was identified by Thardeep because Chachro is flatter terrain with less trees and that makes firewood harder to come by. An alternative source of cooking fuel was a real need. Moreover, since Bharmal is a village of carpet weavers they often need to work at night by the light from kerosene lamps.

The villagers were charged Rs1000 per household as an advance fee and the AEDB hopes to make up the cost by charging a recurring fee of about Rs300 per household per month. Ramesh, a young man from the village demonstrates how the solar power works and brings out the two large discs from which a solar cooker is powered. “Now we don’t need to hunt for firewood and we save on kerosene too,” he says.

The successful experiment is now to be widened to include solar water pumps and plans are being made to install solar energy equipment in a second village. In a place of plentiful desert sun where just four per cent of rural households have access to electricity, this solar project is a source of hope and inspiration. —NM