Bharat Net Project: First phase completed

• Ministry of Communication has completed the first phase of Bharat Net project.
• Under Phase-1, more than one lakh Gram Panchayats of the nation have related to high speed optical fibre network as per the deadline 31 December 2017.
• The network built under Phase 1 will deliver high-speed broadband services in over 2.5 lakh villages and more than 200 million rural people will benefit by this network.
• Second phase of the BharatNet has the target of March, 2019 to usher in a rural digital revolution by connecting 2 lakh and 50,000 Gram Panchayats with broadband network.
• 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 per the ministry, this project has given boost to Make-in-India as the key highlight of the project is that the telecom equipment deployed in it has been fully designed, developed and manufactured in India.
• The project also achieved a global record of daily laying of 800 kilometres of optical fibre.
• 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 will generate massive employment opportunities both direct and indirect in the country in days to come.
• The BharatNet infrastructure is expected to catalyse digital delivery of services for the rural poor – viz. health, education, livelihood, skills, e-agriculture and e-commerce.

About BharatNet

1. According to the Ministry of Communication, BharatNet is the world’s largest rural broadband project.
2. It was created in October 2011 as a National Optical Fibre Network project. Present NDA government changed its name to BharatNet in 2015 on the triple mantra of Create, Collaborate and Conquer.
3. BharatNet project has the mandate to provide high-speed broadband to all panchayats by March 2019
4. 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.