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Prime Minister Inaugurates India Telecom 2011 M-Powering India

Strong Telecommunications Sector Facilitates Economic Development

Shri Kapil Sibal Says Mobile Value Added Service will Empower Common Man

The Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh inaugurated the 6th edition of India Telecom 2011 m-

Powering India here today. Inaugurating the event the Prime Minister said, a strongtelecommunications sector facilitates economic development and promotes at the same time

social well-being. Broadband connectivity is a powerful tool for enabling faster growth and

promoting inclusion, by providing equitable access to information and knowledge.

It is estimated that every 10 percentage point increase in broadband penetration leads to a 1.3

percent increase in a country`s Gross Domestic Product. Therefore, it is the endeavour of our

government to provide broadband connectivity to all village Panchayats in our country, said the

Prime Minister. Since the bandwidth requirements for village Panchayats are higher due to thenature of applications that are used there, it becomes imperative to use optical fibre to provide

broadband connectivity to Panchayats. Towards achieving this objective, over the next 2 years,the government has approved a scheme for creation of a National Optical Fibre Network

(NOFN). The scheme is expected to generate a variety of benefits to our rural people like better

access to education, better access to health and provision for agricultural services, the PrimeMinister added.

The Prime Minister also underlined the objective of the draft National Telecom Policy which

envisages `broadband on demand` by the year 2015. He said, it aims to achieve 175 millionbroadband connections by the year 2017 and 600 million by 2020 at minimum download speed of

two megabits per second. It also envisions high speed and high quality broadband access to allvillage Panchayats through optical fibre by the year 2014 and progressively to all villages andhabitations.

Speaking on the occasion Shri Kapil Sibal, the Minister for Communications and IT said thatmobile technology is a powerful catalyst for personal, national, regional and international

development. It eliminates many economic, cultural, communication, educational, social, and

socio-economic barriers. Mobile empowerment, the Minister emphasized, transcends artificialhuman and natural boundaries to uplift people in all spheres. India is one of the fastest growing

economies across the globe. Shri Sibal said, it is the fourth largest economy in PPP ( Purchasing

Power Parity) terms after USA, China and Japan. The country experienced rapid economic

growth between 2003 and 2007 registering an average annual GDP growth rate of 8.8 per cent. Infiscal 2009, the country weathered the global downturn successfully and registered a GDP growth

of 6.7 percent, second only to China. This performance was primarily driven by the services

sector, which posted a year-over-year growth of 9.7 percent, the Minister said.

Speaking of the phenomenal growth of the telecom sector in India, Shri Sibal said that Indian

Telecom market even with 899 million subscriber base, 120 million internet users, conduciveregulatory environment is far from saturation. With a huge rural market waiting to be tapped, the

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Indian market is largely voice market. It is yet to see the dominance of Mobile Value Added

Services (MVAS), which will change the dynamics and economics of this market. The MVASmarket is expected to increase from INR 122 billion in 2010 to INR 482 billion by 2015, driven

by the uptake of 3G services in urban as well as in rural areas.

In the years to come, MVAS will be the single most important tool for empowering the commonman in India. Innovative and value added services like m-Banking, m-education, m-Health, m-

Governance, m-agriculture, location based services will be delivered to the common man, even in

the remotest corners of the country.

Government of India is committed to empower the common man through cost effective, reliable

and high quality telecom services with strong focus on MVAS. The sustainability of the growthof telecom services depends on strong and vibrant industry, empowered telecom consumers and

strong and forward looking regulation. To build an ecosystem for sustainable growth of telecom

services with a win-win approach, the draft NTP 2011 is unveiled.

Shri Sachin Pilot and Shri Milind Deora, the Ministers of State for Communications and IT alsocommended telecom sector for its efforts and achievements. Welcoming the dignitaries and

delegates on the occasion, Shri Deora flagged that the real challenge in telecom sector is toexpand the rural subscriber base and internet penetration to rural areas. He said, the draft NTP

2011 accordingly envisages to achieve 100 per cent rural teledensity and 600 million broadband

connections by 2020.

Shri Pilot, thanking the organizers, dignitaries and delegates, said that telecom revolution in India

would be complete when it transcends the linguistic, geographical and regional barriers to reachevery nook and corner of the country. When mobile phones are used as a tool of empowerment

and as the hand held device in villages for delivery of economic services, this revolution will lead

to financial inclusion, Shri Pilot added.

Department of Telecommunications (DoT), Ministry of Communications and IT in association

with Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has organized this three

day "India Telecom 2011" with the theme "m-Powering India". It is the 6th year of thisInternational Exhibition and Conference showcasing Indias success story in telecom to the

world.

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(Release ID :78204)