India On The Threshold Of A Broadband Revolution

[abhay 0]

Plans are afoot to open information centres in 2,000 villages across the country with a view to reach benefits of the telecom sector to the rural areas.

Department of telecommunication secretary Dr JS Sharma while delivering the keynote address, through video-conferencing from Delhi, at the inaugural session of the CII telecom and broadband summit 2005 informed this. The number of information centres will be increased over a period of time, Dr Sharma said.

“India's contribution to knowledge economy has been substantial,” Dr Sharma said. “We are on the threshold of a broadband revolution, but we still have a long way to go,” he added.

Dr Sharma stressed that bandwidth will be a major factor over the next few years.

VSNL chairman Subodh Bhargava pointed out that although there has been a leap in terms of technology, but various issues need to be considered like, for instance, “are we over-regulated?” or “is there stability and clarity of policies?”

Mr Bhargava pointed out that today telecom is less about voice and more about text and images. “High-speed internet access is rapidly spreading its wings. It is going to be the driver for telecom sector growth around the world,” he added.

Mr Banmali Agrawala, chairman of CII Maharashtra state council, stressed the need to adapt learning from the telecom sector into other sectors.

“Global broadband is a major growth driver for the telecom industry. We are seeing the emergence of a new world order, which requires integration of it and telecom networks. The need is for trivergence not convergence. Devices have become increasingly complicated, but we are now seeing the emergence of easy to use devices with controls out of the box,” according to Sanjay Gopal who chaired the first plenary session.

Michiel Verhoeven, GM-communications sector-APAC, greater China and Japan, Microsoft, pointed out that while there were 150 broadband subscribers worldwide, India is at the initial stage. “There is a lot of opportunity for growth. Digital adoption is evolving rapidly. There is a need to make it easier for consumers and businesses to adopt broadband solutions,” he said.

Duncan Clark, managing director, BDA ltd, China, noted that India and China together represent 60 per cent of the unserved population. Indian telecom will grow faster than the country's GDP, he predicted.

[RajanPERT 0]

I thought they only know about internet and never seen broadband. and doesn't have any knowledge about Broadband. So they are trying to give the message to world that we have super broadband. But in reality, we don't have any proper broadband solution in our areas except BSNL.

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