Bharatnet

  • September 28, 2020
  • Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
  • Category: DPN Topics
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Subject: Schemes

Context:

  • The lack of workers coupled with a shortage of funds has hit the brakes on the BharatNet work in as many as eight states.
  • These states had written to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) asking for more funds to start work on the second phase of BharatNet.

Concept:

  • BharatNet is a project of national importance to establish, by 2017, a highly scalable network infrastructure accessible on a non-discriminatory basis, to provide on demand, affordable broadband connectivity of 2 Mbps to 20 Mbps for all households and on demand capacity to all institutions, to realise the vision of Digital India, in partnership with States and the private sector.
  • The entire project is being funded by Universal service Obligation Fund (USOF), which was set up for improving telecom services in rural and remote areas of the country.
  • The objective is to facilitate the delivery of e-governance, e-health, e-education, e-banking, Internet and other services to the rural India.
  • The project is a Centre-State collaborative project, with the States contributing free Rights of Way for establishing the Optical Fibre Network.  The three-phase implementation of the BharatNet project is as follows
  • The first phase envisages providing one lakh gram panchayats with broadband connectivity by laying underground optic fibre cable (OFC) lines by Decmeber 2017.
  • The second phase will provide connectivity to all 2,50,500 gram panchayats in the country using an optimal mix of underground fiber, fiber over power lines, radio and satellite media. It is to be completed by March 2019.
  • In the third phase from 2019 to 2023, state-of-the-art, future-proof network, including fiber between districts and blocks, with ring topology to provide redundancy would be created.

Universal service Obligation Fund (USOF)

  • The New Telecom Policy (NTP) 1999 had Universal Service as one of its main objectives: Strive to provide a balance between the provision of Universal Service to all uncovered areas, including the rural areas, and the provision of high-level services capable of meeting the needs of the country’s economy and encourage development of telecommunication facilities in remote, hilly and tribal areas of the country
  • The NTP 1999 provided that the resources for meeting the Universal Service Obligation (USO) were to be generated through a Universal Access Levy (UAL), at a prescribed percentage of the revenue earned by the telecom licensees to be decided in consultation with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).
  • Further, NTP 1999 envisaged the implementation of USO Obligation for rural and remote areas would be undertaken by all fixed service providers who shall be reimbursed from the USOF. Other service providers would also be encouraged to participate in USO provision subject to technical feasibility and would be reimbursed from the USOF.
  • The Indian Telegraph (Amendment) Act, 2003 giving statutory status to the Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) was passed by both Houses of Parliament in December 2003.
Bharatnet Schemes