By Greentech Lead Team: Karnataka Vikas Grameen Bank (KVG
Bank), a regional rural bank in India, will announce its 100th solar village in
Karnataka, India.
According to a report in Business Line, the bank has made
rapid progress in converting villages to complete solar villages.
“We are going to shortly declare the 100th village. To
mark this event, we will be declaring Devagiri, near Dharwad as a complete
solar village,” C Sambasiva Reddy, chairman of KVG Bank.
In the 13 north Karnataka districts, the bank has also
converted 112 of the 500 branches to be dependent on ‘solar-power’. The
branches run entirely on solar energy and thereby chances of disruption in
services because of a break-down in power supply can be almost totally avoided,
thus helping to provide timely service to the rural customers.
In 2011-12, KVG Bank installed 5,000 solar lighting units
and disbursed Rs 9 crore. In the heating segment, 2,800 solar water-heaters,
costing Rs 7 crore have been disbursed.
Since 1994, the bank has installed 34,100 solar lighting
units worth Rs 61.38 crore and 6,387 solar water-heaters costing Rs 17.95
crore. In 2010-11 the bank spent Rs 20 crore on installing around 5,000 solar
lighting units.
For the solar mission, the bank first associated with
Harish Hande, the Magsaysay awardee in the field of solar energy as back as
1994.
To provide solar lighting and solar water-heaters to
un-electrified rural homes in the state, six nationalized banks and RRBs had
installed about one lakh systems at the cost Rs 200 crore at the end of
December 31, 2011.