Speech Delivered by Rajesh Chharia, President of ISPAI on 20th July at Vigyan Bhawan on event
“Next Telecom Revolution-Broadband”
The Man who brought the IT Revolution in India, Hon’ble Chief Guest Shri Sam Pitroda, Our Hon’ble and young Union Ministers of State of Communication & IT Shri Milind Deora and Shri Sachin Pilot, Secretary of Communication & IT Shri R. Chandrasekhar, my Industry colleagues, esteemed ladies and gentlemen.
Good Morning, it’s a great moment for all of us that today under one roof, such great personalities are assembled to show us the Road Map of Success in Broadband just the way it happened with the Telephony. The theme of the event “ Next Telecom Revolution – Broadband” and further subtitles : Bridging Digital Divide between Rural & Urban, Internet for all whether Rural or Urban, Empowerment to Common Man through Broadband is the issue on which our Hon’ble guests will throw light and guide us to move forward so that one day we should be meeting again to celebrate the success of Broadband too like nowadays we are celebrating Mobile and in the whole world we are known as a Super Power in Telephony, but by getting success in Broadband penetration in our country we will be a true SUPER POWER in IT.
Though the Internet came to India one and a half decades back, with privatization happening about 12 years back, ISPs enthusiastically planned a lot of infrastructure for the success of IT sector but this development lags behind the more recent mobile phone segment.
In contrast to more liberal policies in developed nations, Indian Internet Service Providers (ISPs) face more restrictions now than they faced at inception. The visionary decision to make all ISP licenses free has taken a back seat. The ISPs have to migrate to National Long Distance (NLD) & International Long Distance (ILD) to continue with their virtual private networks (VPN) services. 6 % AGR has been imposed on ISPs offering “Restricted – Internet Telephony Services”. IPTV services are being almost denied to ISPs as a cap of Rs. 100 crore net worth has been put on companies (including ISPs) for providing IPTV services. Infrastructure sharing among service providers are not available, as a result they are not able to use the available infrastructure in an optimum way and causing duplication of Infrastructure. The long standing demand of Local loop un-bundling is still pending. The Encouragement needed for creating a positive atmosphere for hosting services within India for faster access, remains a dream.
ISPAI, the Apex body of Internet/Broadband Service Providers in India, believes that urgent policy action is required to remove bottlenecks for growth of Internet in India.
For this, the key measures that need to be taken are as follows:
– Infrastructure sharing, including last mile connectivity to be allowed to ISPs.
– Creation of national backbone administered by a neutral agency that is accessible to all service providers without discrimination
– More de-licensed spectrum for last mile connectivity.
– Loosening of regulations and licensing for broadband applications
– No discrimination in allocating USO fund for ISPs for rural broadband services, as lot of Category A B & C ISP’ are serving in niche market of State head quarters, District and at the tehsil level, very near to Rural India and take lot of initiatives to support Internet usage in those areas.
– Coordinate with various ministries to speed up “online initiatives” and e-governance programmes like Education, Health, IB for entertainment in local regional languages.
– Encourage creation of digital content in regional languages
Theory of “Multiplier user” dreamt by Hon’ble Shri. Pitroda: “We will not be able give phone line to every one but can give phone services to all”, result a grand success in penetration of phone. The same way we should now think for broadband.
An Internet Guru had remarked: Through Internet while the world is squeezing but at the same time our contacts and networking is increasing.
Rajesh Chharia, President “ISPAI”
9811038188
rc@cjnet4u.com
