BSNL’s plans to roll out wireless Internet technology, WiMAX to the rural areas will move a step ahead coming 25th when the bids from the vendors to commission the project shall be opened. This project would establish 7000 Common Service Centers (CSC) across the country from where the WiMAX facility would be operable from. The project is estimated to cost 1500 crore rupees.
The company had only recently awarded the contract for supplying WiMAX base stations in Kerala to the American company, Harris Stratex.
The plans are ambitious not just because of the potential value it can offer in rural governance over a long term, but also because it will help India move forward in enabling more citizens make use of Internet access. The Internet penetration levels have been terribly low at close to 7.1%. This project will also be in line with WiMAX forum’s projection last year that India will be home to 27.5 million WiMAX users by 2012. The bids to be opened on August 25th are for the first of three phases; the latter two of which are for WiMAX establishment in urban areas.
A food for thought here : Wouldn’t it have been better to decide on urban pockets first – and penetrate further from there into the rural areas? I might be wrong, but in my opinion, the rural population don’t need internet to access twitter or facebook, but would need it more so for local governance and agricultural issues. So, how will rural WiMAX help in communication if broadband connectivity is still not established in the adjoining districts? And if the answer to it is that wired broadband is already established in urban areas, then it is hard to believe why our internet penetration is still so low!
Thats a fantastic move IMO.This would a great way to penetrate the rural areas.But,alogwith that there is an intense need to start good quality centres to increase the awareness about Internet.Still we have a mentality that unless we get to see and touch somethings (in this case books,newspaper etc.)with own hands we do not have trust.First of all this needs to change and make people aware of the amount of information present over the net.