
582 SolarBank
Figure 38.3
In 1998, my company, called Solar International Management,
Inc., won a $1.01 million grant from USAID to develop solar financing
and the SolarBank idea in India. We worked with a marvelous man
named Dr. B. S. K. Naidu at Winrock India. We employed Rahul Arora,
Aesha Grewal and others in India to develop a training program, and
we trained 1000 bankers on how to do financing for solar home
systems. The program was led by a most wonderful man named K.
M. Udupa, retired head of the rural bank within Syndicate Bank.
We also worked with the microfinance community to get them
into the financing of solar home systems for their networks