Acknowledging the significance of electrification of all villages of the country, as promised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on many occasions in the last four years, industrialist Anand Mahindra heaped praise on those behind this achievement.

Responding to PM Modi’s tweet in which he had said 28th April 2018 would be remembered as a historic day when every single village of the country has got access to electricity, Mahindra tweeted: “Tweeting from 35k ft via airline wifi.Wifi seems a basic right now!Reflecting on how we urbanites took basic facilities for granted these past decades while so many villages had no access to power&light.This is a moment to acknowledge&appreciate those behind this achievement.”

PM Modi had earlier tweeted: “8th April 2018 will be remembered as a historic day in the development journey of India. Yesterday, we fulfilled a commitment due to which the lives of several Indians will be transformed forever! I am delighted that every single village of India now has access to electricity.”

The electrification of all village is likely to give a boost to PM Modi’s campaign in 2019 general elections. The prime minister said on Saturday that a remote village in the northeast became the last to be connected to the grid.

According to government data, all of India’s 597,464 census villages have now been electrified. In 2014, when Modi came to power, as many as 18,452 villages of the country were without electricity.

The reach of electricity to all villages doesn’t mean all residents also have access to power. The government considers a village electrified if it has the basic electrical infrastructure and 10 per cent of its households and public places including schools, local administrative offices, and health centres have power.

According to the World Bank, as many as 1.06 billion people of the country had no access to electricity across the world last year. India and Nigeria had topped the list.