(Summary: Department of Telecom is seeking fresh perspective on some of the key areas, including broadband connectivity, across Indian cities. The initial presentation, set ambitious target for new government & Wi-Fi would be back at focus, especially at public venues.)
India’s Telecom Ministry, DoT, is setting the agenda for newly elected government, who is likely to take charge of ministry next week. And as reported, Wi-Fi at public places would be back at focus to improve the connectivity for commuters across Indian cities.
Reported first by Telecomlead, a note has been prepared already by DoT secretariat, which is likely to be shared with Cabinet Secretariat. The note lists top ten priority agenda for new government, which also includes up-gradation of network infrastructure along LoC, improving rural tele-density & reaching ambitious goal of 600 million broadband subscribers by 2019.
Although prevalent at public places, Wi-Fi connectivity is still quite poor in India. Many public venues, shopping arcades & airports offer free Wi-Fi for commuters, but speed offered is very limited & connectivity is intermittent often marred by heavy interference. In fact, some of these Wi-Fi hotspots don’t even have seamless coverage, especially across target areas.
Some of the Indian telcos, including MTS, Tata & Reliance are at moment aggressively tapping the Wi-Fi at public venues. Recently MTS has successfully provided Wi-Fi connectivity for commuter on Rapid Metro Gurgaon & similar projects are in pipeline by other telcos. Vodafone has also tied up with Cisco to fill the gap behind Bharti to tap public venues for Wi-Fi. Idea Cellular, another leading telco, has soft launched Wi-Fi for residential societies in few tier-2 cities last year. Reliance Jio, the only PAN India BWA spectrum holder, is piloting Wi-Fi across state of Gujarat. Bharti Airtel, the leading telecom player, is offering Wi-Fi hotspots across four to five major Indian cities, reported on website.
DoT has clearly set its eye on improving Wi-Fi experience by providing connectivity across major public venues across India. We are yet to see, what steps DoT is likely to take to improve the connectivity, especially in case of improving Wi-Fi experience, but one thing is clear, in next five years, the ‘Network Infrastructure’ projects, in category of broadband, are likely to get heavy booster from newly elected government. Wi-Fi & Fiber (NFON) would be hot cakes to tap in.
