India has `1 lakh crore digital connectivity opportunity: BIF President

ndia has a digital connectivity opportunity worth `1 lakh crore at a conservative estimate, which can be largely achieved through satellite communication services, a senior official of industry body BIF said on Tuesday.
Speaking on the sidelines of the 10th edition of India Satcom 2026, Broadband India Forum (BIF) President TV Ramachandran said an analysis of data published by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) shows that around 50 crore or more people in rural India are still not connected to broadband.

“There are more than 50 crore people who are still unconnected, mostly in rural and remote parts of the country. Even if we consider low ARPU from these areas, the present opportunity is at least around `1 lakh crore per annum at present. These people are not connected because the terrestrial network has not reached them. They can be largely served by satcom services,” he said. 

According to Ramachandran, 60 to 70 per cent of the country’s population depends on agriculture and at present there is no way of launching or reaching networks in a viable way to fields.
“But you can modernise agriculture and improve the yields. Our yields are one of the lowest in the world. So there is ample scope for improving that. We can have IoT flooding the fields that can be connected by satcom to collect and monitor agriculture data and improve yields,” he said. Ramachandran said satcom airwaves in the rural areas can help provide good connectivity to private enterprises.   

“If people want to set up a factory in a rural area, labour will be cheap, and there are plenty of available people. These enterprises can utilise satcom connectivity in rural areas,” he said.   
Speaking at the event, Department of Telecom Member (Finance) Manish Sinha.