New Delhi: Shri Santosh Sarangi, Secretary of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, has led a comprehensive progress review to streamline the implementation of the newly introduced Small Hydro Power Development Scheme.
In an administrative briefing with senior Ministry officials, MNRE Secretary Shri Sarangi emphasized the operational mobilization of a central financial outlay worth 2,584.60 crore rupees, a funding pool designed to catalyze approximately 1,500 megawatts of decentralized hydro capacity across India through the fiscal year 2030-31.
Under Secretary Shri Sarangi’s structural oversight, the Ministry is prioritizing smaller, localized generation facilities ranging between 1 and 25 megawatts.
This approach is specifically curated to tap the immense, unharnessed energy potential embedded in India’s hilly terrains and North Eastern states. By keeping generation units minimal and strictly utilizing the natural flow of local rivers and canals, the plan avoids the heavy ecological displacement and land conflicts typical of large-scale dam networks, while simultaneously dropping transmission losses near remote demand centers.
To ensure execution matches the required pace of climate action, Secretary Shri Sarangi reviewed the integration of the scheme’s new end-to-end digital architecture. The entire administrative lifecycle—encompassing new project applications, standard monitoring, Central Financial Assistance claims, and formal financial sanctions—has transitioned to a fully online system to eliminate administrative delays and secure project transparency.
The oversight of the scheme is directly linked to broader national economic goals. Projections indicate that the operational framework steered by MNRE Secretary Shri Sarangi will draw an estimated 15,000 crore rupees in total investments and generate 51 lakh person-days of employment during construction, developing an integrated clean energy ecosystem while generating rural engineering and labor opportunities.