8th December 2011 New Delhi

1Department of

Telecommunications

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Category Assam North East All India

Rural 27.47% 33.51% 36.81%

Urban 142.96% 145.80% 166.54%

Total 44.91% 60.72% 76.03%

Tele-density as on 31Oct. 2011

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Subscribers as on 31Oct. 2011

Category Assam North East

All India

Wireline (PSU) 248683 252274 26990602

Wireline (Private) 2508 225 6199025

Wireline (Total) 251191 252499 33189627

Wireless (PSU) 1538629 1625995 101818045

Wireless (Private) 12052318 6586028 779592774

Wireless (Total) 13590947 8212023 881410819

Total 13842138 8464522 914600446

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Broadband connections in North-East (BSNL)

Capacity Connections

1 Assam 34,626 1,88,028 58,660

2 Meghalaya 39,093 14,921 6,597

3 Mizoram 33,257 11,708 6,583

4 Tripura 53,879 35,920 8,683

5 Nagaland 8,215 19,346 7,482

6 Manipur 9,268 11,210 4,854

7Arunachal Pradesh 7,750 13,656 6,644

8 Sikkim 3,347 6,104 3,210

Total 1,89,435 3,00,893 1,02,713

Internet Connections

Name of State

S. No.

Broadband

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Broadband coverage in NE Region(BSNL)

Total Covered Total Covered Total Covered

Assam 26 26 125 125 25,124 6,995 432 432

Meghalaya 7 7 16 16 5,782 65 89 44

Mizoram 8 8 22 13 707 181 66 32

Tripura 4 4 23 23 858 289 89 56

NE-I 19 19 61 52 7,347 535 244 132

Arunachal Pradesh

16 12 17 15 3,863 34 54 53

Nagaland 11 11 9 9 1,298 1,154 41 13

Mainpur 9 9 40 16 2,315 193 61 1

NE-II 36 32 66 40 7,476 1,381 156 67

Sikkim 4 4 12 12 450 135 58 10

VillagesState

DHQ Cities No of exchanges

ADSL covered

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Common Service Centers (CSCs) coverage in NE Region

DSL EVDOWiMAX-Phase-I

WiMAX-Phase-II

DSPTTotal

Covered

1 Assam Assam4,220 801 51 561 806 0 2,2192 Meghalaya NE-I 177 39 83 0 1223 Tripura NE-I 145 23 0 0 234 Mizoram NE-I 136 74 0 0 2005 Nagaland NE-II 215 50 0 0 2816 Arunachal Pradesh NE-II 649 115 5 0 1207 Manipur NE-II 399 36 0 0 368 Sikkim WB 76 23 0 0 0 23

Total 6,017 1,161 139 918 806 0 3,024

Sl.No Name of State CircleCSCs in circle

Covered

126

231

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8

Universal Service Obligation Fund (USO Fund) was created w.e.f. 01.04.2002, with an amendment of Indian Telegraph Act

A percentage of Viability-Gap is funded to meet the Universal Service Obligations for spread of telecom facilities in remote and rural areas

Originally the thrust was on public & individual access which included Village Public Telephones (VPTs), MARR replacements and Rural Community Phones (RCPs) and Rural lines to individual users (RDELs)

In December 2006, Indian Telegraph Act was amended to include the activities of shared infrastructure, mobile services, broadband connectivity, general infrastructure like OFC etc

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Funded through Universal Access Levy @ 5% of Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) from all Service Providers except the pure value added service providers like Internet, Voice Mail, E-Mail service providers etc

Levy amount is credited to Consolidated Fund of India and made available to USOF after due appropriation by the Parliament

Non-lapsable fund Non-plan budget till 2010-11. Now it is

budgeted under Plan-expenditure Bidding process followed for USOF activities

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Activities under USO Fund are taken up under different Streams of Indian Telegraph Rules

Stream I : Provision of Public Telephone Services Stream II : Provision of Household Telephones in Net

High Cost rural & remote Areas Stream III : Creation of Infrastructure for provision of

Mobile Services in rural & remote areas Stream IV : Provision of Broadband connectivity to

villages in a phased manner Stream V : Creation of general infrastructure in rural

and remote areas for development of telecom facilities Stream VI: Induction of new technological

developments in the telecom sector in rural and remote areas

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Village Public Telephones (VPTs) have been provided in 37,166 villages out of the total of 40,377 inhabited villages in North Eastern Region, with financial support from USO Fund

Remaining villages are expected to be provided with VPTs by May’2012

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S. No.

State Total No. of Villages as per Census 2001

No. of inhabited Villages as per Census 2001

No. of Villages covered with VPTs

No. of Villages yet to be covered with VPTs

1. Assam 26,312 25,124 24,292 8322. Meghalaya 6,027 5,782 4,882 9003. Mizoram 817 707 704 34. Tripura 870 858 858 05. Manipur 2,391 2,315 2,143 1726. Arunachal Pradesh 4,065 3,863 2,595 1,2687. Nagaland 1,317 1,278 1,263 158. Sikkim 452 450 429 21

Total 42,251 40,377 37,166 3,211

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Dysfunctional VPTs working on Multi Access Radio Relay (MARR) technology are being replaced with that of reliable technology VPTs

As on Oct’ 2011, BSNL has replaced 12600 existing dysfunctional Multi Access Radio Relay (MARR)based VPTs in North Eastern Region with reliable technology VPTs (out of 12,796)

Replacement of remaining MARR based VPTs is possible only by satellite phones

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S. No.

State Total MARR based VPTs to be replaced

MARR based VPTs replaced upto 31.10.2011

Balance MARR based VPTs to be replaced

1. Assam 9,294 9,197 97

2. Meghalaya 1,056 999 57

3. Mizoram 527 525 2

4. Tripura 318 318 0

5. Manipur 547 531 16

6. Arunachal Pradesh 440 416 24

7. Nagaland 544 544 0

8. Sikkim 70 70 0

Total 12,796 12,600 196

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S. No.

State Total RCPs to be provided

RCPs provided

1. Assam 1,913 1,913

2. Meghalaya 28 28

3. Mizoram 21 21

4. Tripura 207 207

5. Manipur 89 89

6. Arunachal Pradesh 7 7

7. Nagaland 90 90

8. Sikkim 0 0

Total 2,355 2,355

2355 Rural Community Phones (RCPs)] were to be provided by BSNL in North Eastern Region in villages with population exceeding 2,000 and not having PCO facility

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Agreements were signed with M/s BSNL in March 2005 for provision of individual rural household Direct Exchange Lines (RDELs) to be installed during 01.04.2005 and 31.03.2007 in North Eastern Region

RDELs were to be installed in the eligible 104 Short Distance Charging Areas (SDCAs), where cost of providing telephone connection is more than the revenue earned

1,44,791 RDELs have been provided in North East states till 31.03.2010 i.e. till the closure of the scheme

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S. No.

State Total No. of SDCAs

No. of Eligible SDCAs

RDELs installed

1. Assam 46 26 65,549

2. Meghalaya 14 13 11,054

3. Mizoram 9 9 13,081

4. Tripura 7 5 27,086

5. Manipur 13 10 6,436

6. Arunachal Pradesh 33 30 2,781

7. Nagaland 10 10 17,641

8. Sikkim 2 1 1,163

Total 134 104 1,44,791

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The Scheme was launched for Setting up and managing infrastructure sites for provision of mobile services in rural and remote areas, where there is no existing fixed wireless/ mobile coverage

The habitations of more than 2000 populations covered

Infrastructure so created to be shared by three service providers for provision of mobile services

The agreements effective from 01.06.2007 were signed with the successful bidders in May 2007

As on 31.10.2011, 520 towers out of 574 towers have been set up in NE Region

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S. No.

State Name of the Infrastructure Provider

Total Number of Towers to be setup

Number of Towers commissioned as on 31.10.2011

% Achievement

1. Assam RCIL 87 87 100

2. Meghalaya

KEC 108 107 99.07

3. Mizoram KEC 43 37 86.04

4. Tripura BSNL 115 115 100

5. Manipur BSNL 97 63 64.29

6. Arunachal Pradesh

BSNL 67 61 61.85

7. Nagaland BSNL 51 44 86.27

8. Sikkim VESL 6 6 100

Total 574 520 90.59%

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S. No.

State No. of Towers commissioned as on 31.10.2011

BTS installedAircel

BTS installedRTL/RCL

BTS installedBSNL

Total BTSs commissioned as on 31.10.2011

1. Assam 87 87 87 87 261

2. Meghalaya 107 88 60 69 217

3. Mizoram 37 24 5 23 52

4. Tripura 115 78 12 91 181

5. Manipur 63 6 33 0 39

6. Arunachal Pradesh

61 4 54 0 58

7. Nagaland 44 6 12 0 18

8. Sikkim 6 NA 5 NA 11 (6 VESL, 5 RTL)

Total 520 293 268 270 837/ 1560

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An Agreement was signed with BSNL on 20.01.09 for subsidy disbursement towards provision of wire-line broadband connectivity (with 512 kbps) in rural areas.

Rollout targets are to be met by 2014 The subsidy disbursement is for

Broadband connections, Customer Premises Equipment (CPE) Computer/Computing devices Setting up of Kiosks for public access to broadband services.

Individual Users, Institutional Users such as Gram Panchayats, Hr. secondary schools and Public Health Centers, Kiosks etc are entitled for support

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S. No.

State No. of Rural Exchanges

No. of Broadband Connections to be Provided

Broadband Connections Provided

1. Assam 429 13,299 1,709

2. Meghalaya 56 1,736 97

3. Mizoram 35 1,085 177

4. Tripura 58 1,798 465

5. Manipur 54 1,674 149

6. Arunachal Pradesh 105 3,255 372

7. Nagaland 62 1,922 39

8. Sikkim 47 1,457 60

Total 846 26,226 3,068

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The scheme envisages to provide subsidy support for augmentation, creation and management of intra-district SDHQ-DHQ OFC Network

The aim is to make available the network capacity of 2.5 Gbps (minimum) on sharing basis to other service providers for transport of rural/remote area traffic at the prescribed rates

To start with, Assam has been taken up as first state. BSNL (the selected bidder) has installed about 163 nodes so far (Out of 354)

USOF subsidy will be Rs. 98.89 Crore

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Total Fund collected till Mar’ 2011: Rs.37,223.92 Crore

Balance as on Mar’ 2011: Rs.16,803.84 Crore

Total fund allocated for FY2011-12: Rs.1650 Crore

Total Subsidy disbursed by USO Fund till Oct’ 2011: Rs.14917.07 Crore

Total Subsidy disbursed in North Eastern Region: Rs.321.9 Crore

Total Subsidy disbursed to BSNL: Rs.13039.29 Crore

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AreaMARR-A

MARR-B

MOB-I RCP RDEL-A RDEL-B RDEL-D RDEL-XNEW VPT-I

NEW VPT-II

VPT OPEX

WIRELINE-BB

Grand Total

ASSAM 31.97 1.55 4.76 6.34 33.19 51.48 8.84 3.60 17.11 0.00 17.61 2.09 178.54

NE-I 3.17 1.85 15.84 0.20 8.16 29.83 3.44 3.31 5.81 2.36 6.55 0.28 80.81

NE-II 3.23 0.62 3.14 0.29 14.66 26.25   4.94 6.58 1.48 0.86 0.50 62.55

Total for NER

38.37 4.02 23.74 6.83 56.01 107.56 12.28 11.85 29.5 3.84 25.02 2.87 321.9

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Augmentation of Intra-District SDHQ-DHQ OFC Network Scheme in NE-I (Meghalaya, Manipur, Tripura) to be executed by RailTel and Subsidy is Rs. 89.50 Crore

Augmentation of Intra-District SDHQ-DHQ OFC Network Scheme in NE-II (Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur & Nagaland) and subsidy is Rs.298.50 Crore

A scheme is envisaged for provision of mobile services in all left out uncovered rural & remote areas of the country including those in North Eastern States

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To create an incremental optical fibre network to connect all the 2,50,000 Gram Panchayats by OFC

Size of the incremental network : Approx. 0.5 million route-km

An SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) will be the executing agency.

Tri-partite agreement between Central Government, State Governments and Executing Agency for providing Right of Way

Non-discriminatory access to all the service providers

The network is proposed to be completed in 2 years’ time with an expenditure of Rs.20,000 Crore

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Difficulty in acquisition of land Frequent cable cut during road

widening and repair work by road authorities

Cable cut by other operators during laying of pipe by them

Cutting of cable by antisocial elements Disruption of cable due to land slides

and other natural calamities Poor electric supply

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Difficult working conditions in the region Difficulty in transportation of telecom

goods Due to Insurgency, it is difficult to develop

transmission network in North Cachar Hill and Manipur State

Limited number of contractors in NE Region and problems in executing the work from outsiders

Due to frequent bandh and difficult terrain the working period is limited

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Security for telecom installation is to be provided by State Governments

Free Right-of–Way permission for laying cable

Cases of cable cutting to be investigated

TAX on telecom goods may be exempted

Electric supply to be improved

Provisioning of electric connection be done on priority

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