TelecomLive January-2019

Mobile coverage to soon reach all villages Telecom LIVE January 2019 16 www.telecomlive.com T he department of telecommu- nications (DoT) has taken a decision to be technology neutral in all the USO funded projects. Henceforth, it will specify only Quality of Service “QoS” for Voice & Data (speed) as per Trai's regula- tions. The bidders would be free to quote their own solution and the company quoting lowest Viability Gap Funding (VGF) would be awarded the projects (see scan). In other words, in all future USO funded projects there will be no require- ment of mentioning 2G, 3G, 4G or 5G technology. It is a step in the right direction. The network will be much cheaper now. From the existing available funds, the USOF can provide support to cover remaining villages where the telecommunication services have not reached so far. As per latest official figures, 43,088 villages are yet to receive telecom cover- age (see table). Already various projects such as LWE-Phase-2, Meghalaya and Andaman Nicobar projects are under tendering stage; major part of North East has been awarded to Bharti; and Assam's two districts & Arunachal has gone to BSNL. Together these projects can provide coverage to about 11,000 more villages. Still, about 32,000 villages will be left out. To cover them, at about Rs 20 lakh per tower for 4G technology, only about Rs 6,400 crore would be needed. Earlier this cost was running into over a lakh crore rupee when the tenders were not Mobile coverage to soon reach all villages All USO funded projects will now be technology neutral No. of inhabitated villages (as per census 2011) and No. of inhabitated villages without telecommunication facility Sl State/UT Total villages Uncovered villages No. % 1 Odisha 47,677 9,940 20.85 2 Maharashtra 40,959 6,117 14.93 3 Madhya Pradesh 51,929 5,558 10.70 4 Chhattisgarh 19,567 3,563 18.21 5 Andhra Pradesh 16,158 2,745 16.99 6 Meghalaya 6,459 2,691 41.66 7 Arunachal Pradesh 5,258 2,215 42.13 8 Rajasthan 43,264 1,402 3.24 9 Gujarat 17,843 1,262 7.07 10 Jharkhand 29,492 1,222 4.14 11 Assam 25,372 915 3.61 12 Manipur 2,515 877 34.87 13 Karnataka 27,397 869 3.17 14 Telangana 10,128 647 6.39 15 Uttarakhand 15,745 552 3.51 16 West Bengal 37,478 437 1.17 17 Jammu & Kashmir 6,337 328 5.18 18 Nagaland 1,400 328 23.43 19 Mizoram 704 314 44.60 20 Uttar Pradesh 97,813 295 0.30 21 Bihar 39,073 263 0.67 22 Himachal Pradesh 17,882 211 1.18 23 Andaman & Nicobar 396 165 41.67 24 Tamil Nadu 15,049 83 0.55 25 Goa 320 47 14.69 26 Tripura 863 16 1.85 27 Sikkim 425 13 3.06 28 Haryana 6,642 8 0.12 29 Punjab 12,168 4 0.03 30 Lakshadweep 6 1 16.67 31 Chandigarh 5 - 0.00 32 Dadra & Nagar Haveli 65 - 0.00 33 Daman & Diu 19 - 0.00 34 Delhi 103 - 0.00 35 Kerala 1,017 - 0.00 36 Puducherry 90 - 0.00 Total 597,618 43,088 7.21 technology neutral and 2G+4G technology was specified in the USO funded projects. It is to be noted that BSNL had in Nov 2017 submitted a Detailed Project Report (DPR) to the DoT in which it has stated that it would require Rs 11,812 crore as capex for setting up 4G technology at 100,000 sites across India. This means Rs 11.81 lakh per tower site.