When farmers in Jawhar block of Palghar district in Maharashtra started to migrate to eke out a living, a majority of them believed that they would never be able to develop their farm lands as rains became scarce and temperatures soared for most part of the year.
However, with the the intervention by Bank of America-Merrill Lynch along with a local NGO Pragati Pratishthan, farmers now seem to think twice about leaving their home.
“We focussed on providing energy access by installing solar-power grids and connecting the unconnected. The rationale was to go beyond lighting (using solar power) by providing access to a host of other services, such as helping women use energy to draw water, using drip irrigation to water the fields and so on,” said Neha Kapoor Bharadwaj, India lead, Environmental, Social and Governance, Bank of America-Merrill Lynch.
