The Uttar Pradesh (UP) government will reportedly link 14,100 gram panchayats (GP) with optical fibre network in the next two months.
The project has been undertaken under the National Broadband Mission (NBM).
The state government has set a target to link a total of 58,000 GPs with broadband connections by December 31, 2022. To this end, it has already linked 31,149 GPs with the optical fibre network.
The mission is to be executed in three phases. While, in the first phase, 17,903 GPs were in connected in eastern UP and 10,481 GPs in western UP till December 31, 2020. In the second phase of implementation, 17,032 GPs will be connected in eastern UP and 2,195 GPs in western UP till March 31, 2021. The timeline could possibly be extended to April 30, 2021.
According to industry sources, under this, 5 million km of optical fibre cable (OFC) will be laid to ensure high-speed broadband services in rural and remote areas of the state. Further, tower density is also to be increased from 0.42 to one per 1,000 population, to facilitate access to government schemes in rural areas.
