This tribal village never runs out of gas

Vijaysinh Parmar/TNN 31 March 20BHITBUDRAK: Ilesh Valvi of Bhitbudrak, a remote village in Uchchhal taluka of Tapi district, has eight family members. But, he is never worried about fuel for cooking. In fact, he gets gas supply almost free of cost. And, for this, he has only to give dung to his village's community-based biogas plant. "Daily, we give at least 35 kg dung of cows and buffaloes to biogas plant at 25 paise per kg. And, we get four hours gas supply daily from the plant. For this, we pay just Rs 150 per month. For my family, this gas supply is almost free as we get more money from giving dung to the plant," Valvi says. Presently, there are 121 household gas connections here. This was established two years ago with the help of Sumul Dairy, district panchayat and villagers by spending Rs 20 lakh. Sumul officials claim that this is India's first pressure system based community biogas plant. The plant can produce 170 cubic metre bio-gas daily. Bhitbudrak village milk co-operative manages this plant. "We collect 4 tonnes of dung daily from villagers and pay them 25 paise per kg," says secretary of the village milk co-operative Chunibhai Naik. Interestingly, there are more than 20 such families who have no gas connection, but come to sell dung to the plant as it earns money for them. "I earn at least Rs 300 a month by selling dung," says another villager Dabid Valvi. The plant has also generated employment for the villagers. The vermicompost is being made by the plant's biogas slurry for which at least five people are required to work. Till date, nearly 400 bags of vermicompost have been sold at a price of 130 per bag. "We don't need to rely on other sources of funds to manage and run this plant. We want to establish biogas-based refilling station in the village. But, this requires more capital investment with the help of government," Naik adds. Sumul Dairy chairman Manubhai Patel says, "Through this project we wanted to show how we can adopt environment-friendly technology and ensure self-reliance of villagers." 09,