The department of telecommunications (DoT) proposes to revise the teledensity targets, prescribed in the New Telecom Policy, 1999, for rural areas.
The move comes even as private basic operators are struggling to fulfil their commitments towards setting up telephones in villages.
Under the new methodology, teledensity will be measured on the basis of the number of telephones for a group of houses instead of the existing system of measuring it on a per capita basis.
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Senior DoT officials said the proposal to redefine teledensity assumed significance in the light of the fact that the new basic services licence had stipulated minimum network rollout obligations only at the short distance charging area (SDCA) level. Earlier, basic licence holders were required to roll out services in nearly 100,000 villages.