Broadband to get Rs 18K cr push

Access to broadband services in India has been a failure in the otherwise high performing telecom sector. To address this challenge, the government is planning to spend Rs 18,000 crore over three years to lay a five lakh km optic fibre cable (OFC) network to reach every gram panchayat.

The formation of a Group of Ministers (GoM) to monitor and review the implementation of this broadband initiative is also being considered. Whether the GoM will invite the private sector to participate in the planning of this initiative and focus on wireless as a means of delivery, remains to be seen.

An infrastructure company will be carved out of BSNL to implement the project and work with other PSUs like Power Grid Corporation of India (PGCIL) and RailTel. The venture will be supported financially by the Universal Services Obligations Fund (USOF), which holds a large amount of unutilized resources.

Upon the direction of cabinet secretary K M Chandrasekhar, a committee on broadband connectivity had been formed with officials from six ministries — telecom, HRD, rural development, economic affairs, ministry of panchayati raj and information technology — in addition to the Planning Commission. Chandrasekhar also held discussions with senior officials like Trai chairman J S Sarma and DoT secretary P J Thomas.

The committee is tasked with creating a roadmap for extending affordable broadband connectivity to all villages by leveraging existing infrastructure and augmentation of optical fibre wherever necessary. It is also mandated to pull financial resources from various ministries, including finding ways to subsidize consumer premise equipment using the USOF.

While the plan seems ambitious, the two parts that seem seriously missing are private sector participation and using wireless broadband for such connectivity. The work of the committee has been focused on government or government resources despite the fact that the telecom revolution is almost entirely led by the private sector, at least where mobile telephony is concerned.

And, despite its limitations, wireless broadband connectivity is a faster and cheaper way to reach unconnected areas. With 3G spectrum auctions being scheduled this year the Committee might consider it important to include wireless as an equally important, if not superior mode for connecting rural India.

Source
Times of India

Originally Posted by Triad

While the plan seems ambitious, the two parts that seem seriously missing are private sector participation and using wireless broadband for such connectivity. The work of the committee has been focused on government or government resources despite the fact that the telecom revolution is almost entirely led by the private sector, at least where mobile telephony is concerned.

I don't understand why stringent laws aren't applied on private sector the sense of mutual understanding among various players seems to be the only roadblock towards development on a seamless connectivity. I mean on these times where ISP's on other countries are offering way too higher speeds we are still stuck with kbps speeds with still emphasis on data transfer limits.

Hi,

I mean on these times where ISP's on other countries are offering way too higher speeds we are still stuck with kbps speeds with still emphasis on data transfer limits.

Couldn't agree more with you !! Its really a shame on our ISP's part to enforce such useless policies to curtail the users from getting benefited !!

For Name Sake India is World's IT Hub,but in actuality we are no better then any backward countries !

Anyways coming to actual topic here, guys if you have read it properly this fund that Govt wants to allocate is basically towards the Villages and such to make the BB presence and penetration more in those places !

So I have very little hope that this would do any good for people like Us who live cities ( would love to be proven Wrong though ) !!

Regards.

It is good that government is investing in broadband. It can give result much better than we can imagine. Broadband penetration is an important issue. As no of customers increases ISPs will invest more and we may get better speed. There are lot of people in villages where they have either BSNL or no internet.