The Hindu Business Line : High-speed Net link for one lakh schools

New Delhi April 9 In a bid to catch them young, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd is rolling out its broadband services to one lakh schools across the country by December 2008, as part of a project being embarked upon by the Ministry of Human Resource Development.

The Ministry will provide the details of the schools to BSNL for offering high-speed Internet services. The schools will be connected in four phases.

In the first phase, BSNL will cover 15,000 schools in 1,500 towns by December 2007. This will include 9,000 schools in 900 towns, where the company has its wire line based network and another 6,000 schools in 600 towns, where BSNL will set up its broadband infrastructure over the next two-four months.

Other phases

In the second phase, BSNL will add another 20,000 schools primarily located in rural areas. In the third phase, the telecom major will use wireless technologies such as Wi-Max to cover 10,000 schools in 1,000 blocks.

In the last and final phase about 65,000 schools in 5,000 blocks will be covered. While BSNL will provide the connectivity, the Ministry will equip the schools with the necessary hardware like PCs to access broadband. The details of the schools, which will come under the plan, is expected to be finalised by May.

The Government has given the state-owned telecom company aggressive targets. Part of the roll-out being undertaken by all the operators in the rural areas will be funded through the Universal Services Obligation fund.

There are 2.5 million broadband users , which is expected to touch 10 million by the end of the year.

BSNL had recently awarded a Rs 900 crore broadband equipment contract to UTStarcom, ZTE and Siemens.