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TRAI to government: Liberalize broadband norms

Concerned about slow uptake of broadband in the country, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on November 2, 2005 suggested that the government review some of the norms, especially those relating to last mile access by lessening state-controlled organizations’ monopoly.

Local loop or last mile access can be defined as the copper line or fibre connecting the local node to homes or the line that enters a subscriber’s home from a pole.

Fazed by broadband penetration numbers that is slightly over half a million broadband connections against the targeted three million by the end of 2005, TRAI recommended to the department of telecom the following:

  • Accept an earlier recommendation on unbundling the local loop or last mile access.
  • Reconsider other fiscal measures like tax concessions for broadband equipment and services.

These suggestions given by TRAI along with other suggestions like allowing DTH service providers to offer two-way services like satellite delivered broadband Internet, had not been accepted by the Indian government when it announced the New Broadband Policy in 2004

According to the regulator, the suggestions had been made to give a fillip to the growth of Internet and broadband in India.

TRAI has said that progress reports submitted by various service providers suggest there were only 0.61 million broadband subscribers by end September. Out of this, only 0.26 million subscribers belong to PSUs, while 0.35 million subscribers are serviced by private sector companies.

At the moment, BSNL and MTNL own majority share of last mile access in Indian cities and towns for historical reasons as they have been providing fixed line telephony to Indian homes from the time when private players had not even entered the Indian telecom market.

According to TRAI, many of the competitive service providers have mentioned that the broadband penetration target would be difficult to achieve unless incumbents’ government-mandated monopoly is broken, allowing private players to at least use that infrastructure to deliver various services, including broadband.

( www.indiantelevision.com)

 

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