[Reader-list] 'Denying Broadband to India'

[Shivam]

Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 21:50:52 -0700 (PDT)
  From: Ravinder Singh <povertyfree77 at yahoo.com>
Subject: Denying Broadband To India

Friends,

This is very important message. While going through this message
posted in e.gov I concluded that the cost of providing Broadband in
Indian towns, where power supply is regular could be just a couple of
thousand crores.

Why then our telecom giants have to wait for some state government
initiative to launch this marvelous technology for the benefit of our
people? South Korea, Singapore and most progressing economies are
broadband connected for some years.

Our industry is not interested in technologies, which could
potentially revolutionize our economy.

India has been adopting technologies when they rotting and verge of
being phased out. This leaves us perpetually lagging in development
for our inability to take advantage of the opportunities- the primary
cause of our poverty.

In some areas like irrigation we are still building big leaking canals
when water saving drip irrigation technology is available for several
decades. Thus our food productivity remains at lowest level- and the
number of starving population go on multiplying.

Ravinder Singh 10/09/2004

Rs 1,000 Cr AP Broadband Project.
Source: Financial Express by R RAVICHANDRAN
Posted online: Friday, September 10, 2004 at 0000 hours IST

HYDERABAD:  In a bid to provide seamless connectivity across the
state, Andhra Pradesh government has decided to go in for a mega-
broadband project, in collaboration with private sector service
providers.

Estimated to cost over Rs 1,000 crore, this will be the first time
that a state government will take up such a project. It had invited
expressions of interest (EoI) recently from private service providers
to send in their proposals to design, finance, build and operate the
project.

"If the project goes live, broadband connectivity charges will become
the lowest in India, estimated to be between Rs 100 and Rs 150 per
month or even lower without any additional or hidden charges,"
sources close to the development of the project told FE here.

According to them, though the project cost essentially will be met by
the private participants, the state government will participate with
equity and funding support as a partner to reduce the risks for
establishing such a big project.

Expected to bridge the digital divide, the government had proposed
the low-cost bandwidth project with a 10 GB (gigabyte) connectivity
to all the 23 districts, 1 GB connectivity to all the 1,127 mandals
and 50/100 MB connectivity to all the 22,000 villages and gram
panchayats in the state, sources said.

Randeep Sudan, managing director of the AP Technology Services, the
agency responsible for the mega broadband project, said the state
government is keen to provide seamless connectivity to its people,
businesses and public sector electronic services providers. Moreover,
Internet service providers (ISPs) as well as private telecom
operators can subscribe to this bandwidth for faster and better
operations.

According to RP Sisodia, director of eSeva, one of the co-ordinators
for the project, the government is willing to provide free right-of-
way, wherever needed.

"We expect that the process of selecting bidders will be completed in
the next two months and the name of the successful bidder will be
finalised by November," Mr Sisodia said.

The principal objective is to accelerate the deployment of broadband
by determining technology solutions and selecting credible partners
for providing high quality, affordable and equitable broadband access
and information devices and services.

"The existing technologies are more than five year old and have
become obsolete to provide a direct connectivity from Hyderabad to
districts and mandals," pointed out Jacob G Victor, general manager
of APTS and project in-charge
http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=68304