According to a background note prepared by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for the Economic Editors conference, DoT has projected an investment of Rs 6500 billion in the sector in the next five years.
Also, DoT has made a provision of adding 1,200 million new telephone connections by 2017. The main focus of the next Five-Year Plan (2012-2017) is to enhance broadband penetration in rural areas.
To ensure these targets are achieved, DoT plans to free up about 320 Mhz of additional spectrum. DoT has set a target of 175 million broadband connections by 2017 and also to provide fibre connectivity to 0.25 million village Panchayats.
Addressing the conference, Kapil Sibal, Minister of Telecommunications and IT, said that DoT plans to soon approach the Cabinet for approval of the National Telecom Policy, 2011. He added that DoT hopes to implement the policy by early 2012.
Sibal also said that the policy would be implemented within the tenure of the UPA II, but declined to give an exact time-line. He added that the plan to eliminate roaming charges may be implemented during the UPA II regime.
On the issue of the roaming agreements inked between various operators for providing 3G services, he said that the government may take a liberal view. “We are examining the roaming deals very minutely. The long-term goal of the government is to be flexible and allow spectrum sharing,? he said.
Sibal also said that spectrum sharing would permit more customers to avail these services. He added that the suggestion to extend the scope of mobile number portability was likely to be implemented next year.
