Broadband penetration in India – Broadband Subscriber base, Average connection speeds in India and other countries
By Manoj Govindassamy on 30 October, 2009, 1:55 am
The Government recognizes the potential of Broadband to benefit the Indian economy and is committed to increasing Broadband penetration ever since the year 2004. Similarly, it recognizes the opportunity presented by widespread high-speed access to information and web based communication for the enhancement of quality of life through societal applications including tele-education, tele-medicine, e-governance, entertainment and employment generation.
The main emphasis of the Broadband Policy (introduced year 2004) is on the creation of infrastructure through various technologies that can contribute to the growth of Broadband services. As per the Broadband Policy, Broadband is defined as -
“An `always-on’ data connection that is able to support interactive services including Internet access and has the capability of the minimum download speed of 256 kilo bits per second (kbps) to an individual subscriber from the Point of Presence (POP) of the service provider intending to provide Broadband service where multiple such individual Broadband connections are aggregated and the subscriber is able to access these interactive services including the Internet through this POP. The interactive services will exclude any services for which a separate licence is specifically required, for example, real-time voice transmission, except to the extent that it is presently permitted under ISP license with Internet Telephony”.
The Government acknowledges that the coverage of Broadband services in the country has been limited to date due to infrastructure and other constraints and is committed to improving this. When the broadband policy was framed, the government set a target 3 miilion, 9 million and 20 million broadband subscribers by the year 2005, 2007 and 2010 respectively. But, the reality is totally different. The country is not able to get the targeted broadband subscribers and falls short by a big margin.
One of the key factors limiting the growth of Broadband in India has been the constraint on last mile access. The low fixed line penetration at 3.5%, with not all of these lines capable of supporting Broadband, has resulted in limitations for operators to offer Broadband services. The Government believes that the spectrum allocated in the current Auctions will catalyze the growth of Broadband in India through wireless technology.
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