Original Research Article
Year: 2019 | Month: July | Volume: 9 | Issue: 7 | Pages: 195-202
Are We Really Out of Chulha Trap: A Case Study from a District of Maharashtra
Vaishali Bhole Jaiswal1, Pravin U. Meshram2
1Research Scholar, Department of Environmental Science, SMM, Rashtrasant Tukdoji Maharaj Nagpur University.
2P. U. Meshram, Associate Professor and Head, Department of Environmental Science, Sevadal Mahila Mahavidyalaya and Research Academy, Nagpur
Corresponding Author: Vaishali Bhole Jaiswal
ABSTRACT
Solid biomass fuel pollution is the largest energy related health risk globally and most important cause of ill-health for Indian women and girls. At 700 million cooking with open biomass chulhas, the Indian population exposed has not changed in several decades, in spite of hundreds of programs like improved chulhas, i.e. to burn biomass cleanly in advanced stoves. These 700 million of the poor were stuck in the chulha (open cookstove) trap for 25 years at least. Until recently, there were no special programs or efforts to accelerate growth of clean fuel in the population. Starting in the year 2015, the Government of India and Oil Marketing Companies that market LPG started three major programs to actively promote LPG to the poor, each pioneering, and relying heavily on social marketing and electronic bank accounts, biometric ID cards, and mobile phones (JAM). The first program Pahal, second, “Give it Up,” and third, Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY), starting from 2016 provided connections to 50 million households till 2018. This paper tries to analyze the penetration of LPG in rural area of Nagpur district of Maharashtra, and issues and challenges in switching to clean cooking fuel in rural areas of district.
Key words: Biomass, house hold air pollution, Chulha trap, LPG, PMUY, Maharashtra.