National Capital Region (India): Telecommunication

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This article has been sourced from an authoritative, official publication. Therefore, it has been ‘locked’ and will never be thrown open to readers to edit or comment on. After the formal launch of their online archival encyclopædia, readers who wish to update or add further details can do so on a ‘Part II’ of this article.

The source of this article

Draft Revised Regional Plan 2021: National Capital Region

July, 2013

National Capital Region Planning Board, Ministry of Urban Development, Govt. of India, Core-4B, First Floor, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, New Delhi-110003

National Capital Region Planning Board

BACKGROUND

Delhi has a large network of telecom facilities, which is vital for various economic activities and this has helped in concentration of these activities in Delhi in preference to other locations in the region. Likewise, provision of effective and efficient Telecom facilities in the entire NCR holds immense significance in the context of Regional Plan, where the ultimate aim is to promote growth and balanced development in the entire region. Telecommunication sector has witnessed phenomenal growth during the last decade. Growth of mobile telephony has been the most visible indicator and catalyst for economic growth. Most encouraging feature has been the growth in coverage and increase in the number of subscriber in rural areas with low tariffs.

Overall teledensity has increased from 18.31% to 78.66% during the eleventh plan period. This contributed to rise in the living standard of the people, awareness of its importance and personal conveniences. Thus, a rapid increase in demand for telephones has been generated in Metro centres, Regional centres and other smaller towns and villages in NCR. Review of the Regional Plan-2001 undertaken in the year 1999 emphasized the need to bridge the gap between demand and supply of telephones in the region and to upgrade all the remaining electromechanical telephone exchanges to electro-digital exchanges and connect the same with modern transmission media such as optical fiber cables etc.

EXISTING STATUS

Over the last few years, significant improvement has been made in terms of capacity and technology upgradation to keep pace with the changing trends. The telecommunication sector has been dominated by a preference for wireless phones, which increased from 80.19 per cent (165.09 Million) in March 2007 to 96.62 per cent (919.17 Million) in March 2012. While the wireless led penetration appears impressive, it is dominated by private sector players and voice telephony services. The mobile broadband services also need to keep pace with the voice telephony growth.

The National Telecom Policy-2012 seeks to achieve broadband on demand and envisages leveraging telecom infrastructure to enable all citizens and business, both in rural and urban areas to participate in the internet and web economy thereby ensuring equitable and inclusive development. The objective is to transform the country into an empowered and inclusive knowledge based society using telecommunication as a platform. The Policy also emphasize on providing affordable and quality telecommunication services in rural and remote areas.