It has almost been six months that Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the country fully electrified.

But Peknapara, a small village on the Assam-Meghalaya border under the Rongjuli development block of Goalpara district in lower Assam, has a different story to tell.

This tribal village under the Kothakuthi gaon panchayat is inhabited by about 60 families. Electric poles were installed in their village way back in 1988 as only as witness to the fact that there was an attempt to electrify the village.

“It was probably 1984 or 1988 that the then Assam State Electricity Board (ASEB) officials came to our villages and erected the cement posts,” said Nelsin Sangma, a 55-year-old villager.

Dagaram Momin, village secretary of the Peknapara and neighbouring Dumapara and Chekowari part-III villages, said, “We submitted the necessary documents to the Dhupdhara office in 1984. Since then we have been visiting the office with no result. We even went to former MLA Dudhnoi Sibcharan Basumatary, who assured us to do the needful but nothing has happened.”

“Can you imagine a life without electricity? We have one or two solar lights and charge our mobile phones in the neighbouring villages,” added Dagaram.

The Peknapara villagers said the Dhupdhara electricity office had promised them power by February this year. “But it is already October and nothing has happened,” said another villager.

Expressing grievance over their plight, the villagers asked, “If the Meghalaya government can provide electricity to the houses on their border villages like Adogiri, then why can’t the Assam government do the same?”

Talking to The Telegraph, Dhupdhara electrical subdivision deputy manager, Monirul Islam, said, “This remote area was previously under the contract of Diamond Company and recently taken over by NK Power Company. Many villages in the same gaon panchayat have been covered under the Deendayal Upadhyay scheme. This village, which will require only a 63KVA transformer, will also be under the scheme.”

He said he would take initiative to electrify the village.

“I am new in the area but I will definitely bring the village under the Gram Swaraj scheme and provide power connections before December,” he said.

Shymanta Rabi Bara, circle officer, Rongjuli, also said he would to take up the matter. “I will surely look into it,” he said.