Power Minister Piyush Goyal on Thursday told the Lok Sabha that the Centre aims to ensure that all households in the country have electricity before August 15, 2022, and all villages before May 2018. He also claimed that the government will accomplish these tasks much before their deadlines, PTI reported.

Goyal further said that the Centre hoped to reduce the losses incurred by distribution companies with the help of state governments. Accumulated losses of discoms increased from Rs 2,53,700 crore in 2012-13 to Rs 3,60,736 crore in 2014-15, the minister said during the Question Hour.

Annual losses in states reduced by approximately Rs 11,000 crore in 2015-16 and 2016-17 after the Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana was launched, Goyal said, adding that the generation capacity of all conventional sources of electricity had risen by more than 99,000 MW since 2012-13.