Tamil Nadu FibreNet Corp signs agreement for BharatNet project implementation

• Tamil Nadu FibreNet Corporation Ltd (TANFINET) signed the Master Service Agreement for the implementation of BharatNet Project in Tamil Nadu (two packages) with various system integrators.
• The project aims at providing 1 Gbps bandwidth connectivity to all Gram Panchayats.
• It signed the agreement with L&T (for Package C); ITI Ltd (Package D) and Third-Party Agency BECIL in the presence of Information Technology minister T Mano Thangaraj and IT Secretary Neeraj Mittal.

BharatNet

Vision

• 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.

Implementation

• 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. For success in phase-2, which will also involve laying of OFC over electricity poles, the participation of states will be important. This is a new element of the BharatNet strategy as the mode of connectivity by aerial OFC has several advantages, including lower cost, speedier implementation, easy maintenance and utilization of existing power line infrastructure. The last mile connectivity to citizens was proposed to be provided creating Wi-Fi hotspots in gram panchayats
• 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.
• As on 31.12.2017, the status of implementation of BharatNet is as under:-

• No. of GPs where OFC laying is completed : 1,09,926 GPs
• Optical Fibre Cable laid : 2,54,895 km
• Broadband Connectivity provided in GPs : 1,01,370 GPs

National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN)

• National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) is an ambitious initiative to trigger a broadband revolution in rural areas. NOFN was envisaged as an information super-highway through the creation of a robust middle-mile infrastructure for reaching broadband connectivity to Gram Panchayats.
• The National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) aims to connect all the 2,50,000 Gram panchayats in the country and provide 100 Mbps connectivity to all gram panchayats (GPs).
• To achieve this, the existing fibres of PSUs (BSNL, Railtel and Power Grid) were utilised and incremental fibre was laid to connect to Gram Panchayats wherever necessary.
• Dark fibre network thus created was lit by appropriate technology thus creating sufficient bandwidth at the Gram Panchayats.