BharatNet monetisation is on track, says K Rajaraman

Speaking at the recently held Rising India Summit, K. Rajaraman, Secretary, Department of Telecommunications said, “Before us was the onerous task of connecting 250,000 gram panchayats, out of which that construction is on in 220,000 and 190,000 have already been wired up the optical fiber cables.

Regarding monetization, we have a commercial plan in place. Partly subsidized, as the box is given free, we provide bandwidth at a reasonable cost, and in the last four or five months have reached about 250,000 households.

It is amazing, that the per household consumption has reached nearly 160 GB per month. There was a huge pent-up demand and I am sure that the way we are expanding, we will be satisfying the all India requirement for information and connectivity to the world.

As 5G is rolled out, BharatNet is a great opportunity that will complement the mobile networks.

It is true that the private sector has not shown much interest, as because of regular construction and digging, the cost of maintain an optic fibre cable network is too high. We have decided that BSNL will maintain it, run it, and then monetize the last mile, and that seems to be coming up well.”

CT Bureau