Toll from mines: A miner carries a heavy load of wet coal hundreds of feet up from a deep coal mine shaft near Rymbay village in the Indian north-eastern state of Meghalaya. India wants to mine its coal to power the nation, but the plan is hampered by environmental concerns. — AFP
Some 400 million Indians without electricity will be connected, but plans for new coal mines are controversial.
The village of Geer in Madhya Pradesh, India is about to undergo the simplest of revolutions. After 25 years of being told electricity is coming, it is finally here. “After sunset, we can’t do anything so we sit in the darkness. The children cannot study. We go to bed early,” says Chotelal Gupta, who runs the nearest thing Geer has to a shop. It is no more than a cupboard really, selling sweets and biscuits. But in the last few weeks, Gupta has started to stock lightbulbs as the villagers wire up their homes.
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