With the promise of rationalising levies including spectrum charges to rejuvenate the debt-ridden telecom sector, the draft new telecom policy proposes broadband access for all with 50 mbps speed, 5G services and 40 lakh new jobs in the sector by 2022.
The draft policy branded as 'National Digital Communications Policy 2018' was unveiled by the government yesterday. It also aims to attract USD 100 billion in the digital communications sector by 2022 with help of regulatory reforms.
The draft also proposes to address woes of the sector by reviewing licence fees, spectrum usage charges, universal service obligation fund levy - all of which add to cost of telecom services.
The policy aims to accomplish provisioning of broadband for all, creating 40 lakh additional jobs in the digital communications sector and enhancing its contribution to 8 per cent of India's GDP from about 6 per cent in 2017.
Under the new policy, the government aims to enable fixed line broadband access to 50 per cent of households and start landline portability services.
The policy suggests providing universal broadband coverage at 50 mbps to every citizen and providing 1 gbps (gigabit per second) connectivity to all gram panchayats by 2020 and 10 gbps by 2022.
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It proposes to adopt "Optimal Pricing of Spectrum" to ensure sustainable and affordable access to digital communications. High spectrum price and related charges have been main concern of telecom services segment which is reeling under a debt of around Rs 7.8 lakh crore.
The draft policy also proposes recognising of mid-band spectrum, particularly the 3 GHz to 24 GHz range, for next-generation networks.
It also outlined roadmap for high in demand backhaul spectrum for transmitting signals between mobile towers in E and V band as per international best practices.
"Promoting the effective utilisation of high capacity backhaul E-band (71-76/81-86 GHz) and V-band (57-64 MHz) spectrum in line with international best practices ..Rationalizing annual royalty charges for microwave links for backhaul connectivity," the draft
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