LaBL model - present and future
Student name: Mr Prateek Johri
Guide: Dr Manipadma Datta
Year of completion: 2012
Host Organisation: The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI)
Supervisor (Host Organisation): Mr Debajit Palit
Abstract: The project was undertaken to give the Lighting a Billion Model a holistic review from the
perspective of a third party who is not a stakeholder in the project. The project gave me an
exposure to the working environment of the most rural people in India and got me closer to
their needs and desires.
The project being an initiative to be launched in the places which have no or low electricity
and the buying power of the people being very less, it was never the aim to generate profit.
The main objective was to provide clean energy solutions to the people of the World who
have very low or absolutely zero amount of electricity at rates which are affordable to them.
The attempt was to make the model self-sustainable by generating local capacities and
employment opportunities at the local level and ultimately TERI coming out of the model
without affecting its efficient working. Since the work was to be done at local village levels,
NGO route was chosen as they have an established network in their areas of existence and the
people trust the organizations which can help in giving a good impetus to the initiative.
The model worked very well for the initial two-three years but then started generating
problems since there were many limitations in the model. The product was sustainable but the
model itself started to collapse hence making the initiative a non-viable option.
The report aims to bring out the flaws of the present model and plug in the gaps by using the
research findings and accordingly tweaking various parts of the model to help the project
become sustainable for the future. The research findings are limited and strictly made
available according to the research carried out in 22 villages of 4 states of India.
