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Rajya Sabha
The following steps are being taken for expanding and improving the telephone network in rural areas:
(i) Provision of support from Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) for operation and maintenance of existing Village Public Telephones (VPTs), installation of VPTs in the remaining villages, provision of additional Rural Community Phones (RCPs) in villages with population exceeding 2000, replacement of Multi Access Radio Relay (MARR) based VPTs to Public Telecom and Info Centres (PTICs) for providing both voice and data access.
(ii) Provision of telephone on demand with support from USOF in 1,685 commercially unviable SDCAs out of total 2,647 SDCAs in the country by January, 2006. This will cover a significant part of the rural areas of the country.
(iii) Large scale deployment of Wireless in Local Loop (WLL) system including provision of at least one Base Transceiving Station (BTS) in each Short Distance Charging Area (SDCA).
(iv) Opening of new exchanges at places which have a minimum demand of 150 within 5 Kms. radius of the proposed exchange site.
This was stated by the Minister of State for Communications & Information Technology, Dr. Shakeel Ahmad, today in the Rajya Sabha in a written reply to the question by Bashistha Narain Singh.
Dr. Ahmad further said that under 'Bharat Nirman' Scheme VPTs will be provided in 66,822 unconnected villages progressively by November, 2007 with an outlay of Rs. 451 crore. This excludes villages which are disputed, inaccessible or having population less than 100. These 66,822 villages also include 14,183 villages in remote and far flung areas which are to be provided by Digital Satellite Phone terminals.
The Minister further said that 248 applicants are in the waiting list for new telephone connections at Buxor (Bihar) as on 31.3.2005. The work of capacity expansion of Buxor exchange by 2000 lines is under progress and the above waiting list is likely to be cleared by December, 2005.
RM/AMA – 250805 Rural Network USQ 3160
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