Despite aggressive campaign of ‘Digital India’ initiative, Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led Government has expressed that there is still more to be done to connect the unconnected million of people of the country as far the Internet market of India is concerned.
“As we speak, India has overtaken the US to become the world’s largest Internet market with 343 million users. This talks about progress and achievements of the Indian telecom sector. Having said that, still more needs to be done to connect millions of people who don’t have access to connectivity,” said Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha at India Telecom 2016 on Tuesday.
The Government is open to framing ‘more conducive’ telecom policies to suit business needs of offering quality service to consumers and will soon usher in reforms in providing easy access to quality backend spectrum required for transmitting mobile signals. “Our efforts will continue in making conducive and progressive policies and creating business-friendly environment in the country. Industry has to continue to devote efforts to increasing and upgrading quality through innovation and competition,” Sinha added.
Announcing the next ‘India Telecom’ event for the next year, the Telecom Minister said, “DoT will organise India telecom event every year to facilitate interaction between the industry and the Government. The next India Telecom event will be held on October 26-27, 2017,” Sinha said.
Underlining the need for a reliable and robust broadband connectivity infrastructure for a transformational growth of the telecom sector in India, RS Sharma, Chairman, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), also said, “In order to achieve the goal of the initiative which is to connect India digitally, there are three pre-requisites namely - digital infrastructure, software and digital services and digitally empowered citizens.
“Digital infrastructure consisted of hardline infrastructure, which included broadband and networks, and soft infrastructure, comprising e-payment gateways,” he said, adding that with its low internet and broadband penetration, India is at the 131st position in the UN ranking, way behind countries like Sri lanka.
Telecom Secretary J S Deepak also said the Department of Telecom (DoT) is working on ending some of the permits like wireless operating licence and bringing in reforms in backhaul spectrum so that operators are able to conveniently transmit their services. “We are going to work on reforms in the area of backhaul spectrum and very soon, you will see some movement there. Besides reforms, there will be easy availability of backhaul spectrum,” Deepak said.