The Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development has written to the Kathmandu Metropolitan City, nine sub-metropolitan cities, and 96 municipalities, asking them to send to the ministry the details of solar lights installed in their respective areas under the ‘Public Participation-Based Solar Street Light Programme’.

Earlier, the government had set the deadline of the first quadrimester of the current fiscal for installation of solar lights.

A grant amount of approximately Rs 999.495 million was allocated to the designated municipal areas for the installation of as many as 43,851 solar-powered street lights in various areas.

Of them, Kathmandu Metropolitan City and Lalitpur Sub-metropolitan city were asked to install 7,369 and 2,082 solar lights respectively. Major municipal areas, including Kathmandu, Lalitpur, Bhaktapur, Damak, Biratnagar, Birgunj, and Dharan were also entitled to more solar lights on the basis of urbanisation and population.

The government has planned to gradually install solar lights along around 710 kilometres of roads in various municipalities and village development committees across the country to replace halogen, CFL, and mercury-vapour lamps.

The programme is aimed at illuminating urban and rural settlements with solar-powered lights and saving consumption of electricity to end load-shedding.

The government, local bodies and consumers will bear 60, 25 and 15 per cent of the total respectively in the Kathmandu Metropolitan City. In case of other places, the government will make an investment of 65 per cent while local bodies would bear 20 per cent and consumers 15 per cent.

The division of the cost is 70, 20 and 10 per cent of total cost respectively in highly-deprived settlements. The programme is expected to save at least six megawatts of electricity, said the MoFALD.

Municipalities call for proposals from consumers’ committees, citizen awareness centres and area development organisations for their involvement in the programme. The proposal includes necessary details and feasibility study.