'1 lakh villages to get internet connectivity by month end'

Come March end and 1,00,000 villages would get internet connectivity as the work under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's flagship programme Digital India to connect every village with internet is in full swing.

According to Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha, the government is targeting to connect the BharatNet project by March end. As per the latest report, the trenching work has been done in 96,000 villages, while about 80,000 villages have been provided with optical fibre network, Sinha said in Rajya Sabha while replying to the question of BJP member Amar Shankar Sable during the Question Hour.

Sinha further told the House that it's the topmost priority of the government to complete the BharatNet project within the stipulated time as it's the responsibility of the government to connect 2.5 lakh villages through optical fibre network by December 2018.

In reply to Congress member Jairam Ramesh's question about government's plan to provide connectivity to consumers in Gram Panchayat, Sinha said, "It's a genuine question. The government has decided to install two WiFi hotspots in every village to make available the internet service to villagers."

The phase-I aims to cover 1 lakh GPs and will be completed by 2017. So far, 78,220 GPs have been connected through optical fibre connectivity (OPC), 16,748 GPs have been lit and trenching and ducting have been completed for 96,080 GPs, Sinha said.

Clarifying over some delay in expediting the ambitious project, Singh said, "The process got little delayed due to shortage of GPON (Gigabit PON) device as there was only vendor engaged for it. It's due to unavailability of the GPON device that we didn't linked villages. We have rectified it by terminating the vendor."

Notably, GPON uses optical wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) so a single fiber can be used for both downstream and upstream data.

BharatNet project, earlier known as National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN), was launched in 2011 by the previous government and has already missed several deadlines.

The project is funded by Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) with the aim of providing broadband connectivity to 2.5 lakh gram panchayats (GPs).

The government has allocated Rs 6,000 crore for 2016-17 fiscal. Of which, Rs 4,617 crore has been received to promote rural basic infrastructure and the entire amount has been utilised. Till February this year, Rs 47,924.76 crore has been deposited in USOF, he said.