Reducing the burden - Solar pumping in Melghat

Maitri is a Pune based NGO working with local communities in the remote Melghat region of Maharashtra state, close to the border with Madhya Pradesh.

In one of the villages, Ruipathar, the women had to carry all the water they need for running their household (except laundry) up the hill, usually 2 or 3 times a day.

Maitri first contacted AURORE in March 2008 to inquire about a solar pumping system for Ruipathar village in Melghat. Rishi went for an assessment to Melghat in April and subsequently Maitri managed to raise the funds to implement the project.


The solar pumping system was designed to pump water from a borewell some 50 m at the bottom of the hill to a tank right in the centre of the village.An Aurore India team, consisting of Rajesh, Manikandan, Nitin and Jos arrived in Melghat on July 10th, and immediately started the work.The villagers had already dug most of the long trench from the borewell to the tank.

The best location for the solar panels was agreed upon with the villagers and work the casting of the foundations for the manual trackers started.

On day 2 the HDPE water pipe was unrolled, connected to the submersible pump and lowered into the borehole.

On the final day of installation (day 3) the solar panels were mounted onto the trackers and wired up to supply DC current to the pump.

The pump was switched ON and water started to flow into the tank. You should have seen the faces of the villagers! :-)

We stayed on for another day to make sure the system was pumping fine and help the local plumber with putting in the distribution lines to the tap-stands.

At the end of the day the team could relax and prepare for their return to Auroville

After all the excitement of the past days village life returned to normal, with the exception that women carrying water on their heads up the hill will become more of a rarity in Raipathar village from now onwards.

Sani clinic, Zanskar, Ladakh

It was still relatively quiet in Ladakh when the AuroRE team headed up there this year for the installation of a 1,050 Wp solar PV system at a remote clinic in Zanskar valley in the second week of June.

Rishi, Hemant and Jos all met up in Delhi where a jeep was loaded with the solar panels, sealed maintenance-free batteries, the aluminium mounting structure and boxes with accessory cables, charge controller, inverter, etc.

This was the 6th consecutive year that Aurore was doing an installation in Ladakh, one of the most remote regions of India, high up in the Himalayas.



The 5 day journey in the jeep took us from Delhi via Manali, Leh and Kargil to our end-destination, Sani, 10 km from Padum, Zanskar valley's main town.

There Dr Rainer Lezius (Germany) has initiated a project to preserve traditional Ladakhi herbal medicine by building a small clinic-cum-community centre.

Raising funds through Fördervereins Sani Zanskar e.V. made it possible to build the small building, which was completed last year.
What was missing though was a reliable source of electrical power for lighting the rooms, as well as provide power for laptop computers and other small electrical devices.

Rainer contacted Aurore and a suitable solar PV system was designed and prepared in Auroville before being shipped to Sani village.

Nadeem, our 'local' electrician had already done the ground work in the previous days by fitting all the internal house-wiring in the building. This made it possible for us the complete to entire installation in a record 1.5 days and we commissioned the system on June 12th.



One of the monks of the local Sani monastery came to have a look and gave the solar panels his blessing! :-)