The ambitious National Optic Fibre Network (NOFN) project is set to undergo a major revamp in its entire structure post a high-level review by PM Narendra Modi earlier this month.
By Sanjay Singh
Apart from roping in the private sector, state governments are also being roped in to widen the inflow of funds and for speedier completion of the project, which aims at linking the country’s 2.5 lakh villages by high speed broadband services.
Communications and IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has convened a meeting of all state IT ministers and secretaries on May 29 to discuss the ways in which they can become partners in the project. Some states such as Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu have already proposed to the Centre that they be made in-charge of implementing it in their respective states.
Since the project aims at linking the district headquarters with blocks and villages through broadband, the state governments would be best equipped to implement it and can also provide faster right of way for putting the fibre, they have argued.
Sources said that at the meeting, Prasad is going to explore which states are willing to come on board and to what extent, both operationally and financially. Since the project would also involve the private sector, fresh mapping would be done.
The project, which is running behind schedule but is critical to the PM’s Digital India programme, is currently being implemented by Bharat Broadband Nigam, a subsidiary of state-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam. Other PSUs like PowerGrid and RailTel are also part of it. Work allocation between the three is in the ratio of 70:15:15.
However, recently a government appointed committee, comprising former Nasscom presidents Kiran Karnik and Som Mittal, former secretary, department of electronics and information technology, J Satyanarayana, and USOF administrator Aruna Sundararajan, recommended a mode which is a mix between central public sector undertakings, state governments and the private sector.
“The committee was deeply conscious of the need to ensure that the implementation model should not lead to a single agency enjoying, directly or indirectly, the ability to control the network or market power in dictating prices,” the report has noted.
It also suggested that the project be renamed Bharat-Net and be headed by a chairman from the private sector.
Roping in the private sector and state governments would also bring about additional funding since the committee has reviewed the cost upward to around Rs 70,000 crore from the current Rs 21,000 crore.
Currently, the entire funding is coming from the universal service obligation fund, which has funds of around Rs 50,000 crore, but making it available would be tough since this levy from the telecom operators flow in the consolidated fund of India and is diverted to other usage as well.
Earlier, a review by the department of telecommunications on the status of the implementation of the project threw up the fact that it was moving at a tardy pace in almost all circles with even tenders not in place.
For instance, out of 1.2 lakh km of work to be done in phase-I ending March 2015, only 13,000 km of pipe and 7,400 km of cable has been laid so far. Work has started in only 455 blocks of the total 6,533 blocks earmarked for the first phase.
Wiring up
* Telecom minister to meet state IT secretaries on May 29
* Private sector to be roped in for the project
* States like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala have evinced interest
* Remodelling to further delay project, push up cost from R20,000 crore to over R70,000 crore