The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : 3G, WiMax in January

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Sunday, Sep 14, 2008
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3G, WiMax in January

Special Correspondent

Rollout as per schedule, says A. Raja

CHENNAI: The Government is committed to rolling out 3G and WiMax technologies in January, 2009, Union Minister for Communications and IT A. Raja said on Saturday.

Inaugurating the first India Mobile Congress, 2008, hosted by the National Agro Foundation, Mr. Raja said the rollout would revolutionise India’s Information and Communication Technology scenario. The rollout would go as per schedule despite apprehensions raised in some quarters. “The next year (2009) will be the year of telecom revolution,” he said. The conference theme was “The Great Rural Revolution.”

Mr. Raja said efforts made by the industry, coupled with the government’s proactive policies, had helped the telecom sector grow on an unprecedented scale. India, with over 300 million mobile connections, housed the second largest mobile wireless network after China. The mobile sector was also the world’s fastest growing sector, adding over 8 million subscribers every month, he said. “With this growth trajectory, we are well poised to surpass the set target of 500 million connections well before 2010,” Mr. Raja said.

The Minister said the connectivity revolution, a major driver of economic growth, had resulted in a situation in which every one in four Indians had access to mobile phone. The target was to improve the ratio so that one out of every three Indians had a cellular device.

Having achieved a tele-density of 73 per cent in the urban sector, the government was now committed to improving connectivity in rural areas. Thanks to the favourable policies and a robust industry, rural tele-density had crossed 11 per cent, well ahead of the 4 per cent target for 2010 as defined by the National Telecom Policy, 1999.

Projects such as providing subsidy support for infrastructure sharing, provision of 7,000 mobile towers and the proposed addition of 11,000 towers would change the face of mobile telephony in rural India, he said.

Siddhartha Behura, Secretary, DOT, said the sector must focus not only on numbers but ensure that communication gadgets became a tool to empower citizens, bridge the digital divide and deliver world-class voice and data communications at affordable rates.

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