Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Saturday, Dec 25, 2004
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Saturday, Dec 25, 2004 |
|
|
|
|
|
Info-Tech
-
Telecommunications `Mobile networks need not monitor voice, data flow' 151 Govt has to tighten, update cyber laws: Mittal Our Bureau
Mr. Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman and Group Managing Director, Bharti Enterprises. - - Kamal Narang
New Delhi , Dec. 24 BHARTI Enterprises Chairman and Managing Director, Mr Sunil Mittal, today came out against monitoring of voice and other data flowing through telecom networks and called for better societal discipline, mobile etiquette and up-to-date cyber laws. He said this when asked whether mobile service providers have any role to play in preventing incidents such as `MMS scandal'. "No customer would want his conversations, messages, pictures to be monitored by the telecom network and it would also amount to breach of privacy. Mobile networks have nothing to do with it," Mr Mittal told presspersons on the sidelines of `Pan IIT 2004' event. In tackling such problems, the Government would have to fill the loopholes in IT laws and make the laws up-to-date, he said. It was wrong to implicate multi-media messaging service (MMS) in the scandal involving Delhi school students. "It was not MMS. Such a huge file cannot be transferred over MMS. Somebody took a picture from a camera and put it on the Internet after uploading it on the computer. MMS has nothing to do with it," he added. He added the country's mobile subscriber base would touch 100 million in the next two years, up from the present level of about 44 million, with the growth mainly coming from non-urban and non-metro circles. He added that Bharti's services would be extended to Bihar, Jharkhand, North-East and Assam by March. He added that three-fourth of the earmarked investment of Rs 3,500 crore for the current fiscal has been already made in rolling out networks. He was, however, non-committal on whether telecom tariffs could come down further. "It is already in paise... It is yet to be seen how much lower it can be brought down to... access deficit charge and licence fee should be lowered," he said. Meanwhile, the Pan IIT or the global IIT alumni event, began here today with over 2000 participants turning out. "Educational institutions need to open up and collaborate with the industry in a significant way," said Mr Mittal in his keynote address in the event. "You can't commercialise your ideas and we can't dream of those ideas." The two-day event has lined up over 15 business sessions on a range of topics including biotechnology, harnessing Indian brain power and intellectual property rights, business process outsourcing, automotive sector, water and sanitation and power, among others. "We would be finalising the recommendations of the various committees by tomorrow," said Mr Pradeep Gupta, co-Chairman Pan IIT India Executive Council. "The turnout at this event is over 2000. The first Pan IIT event was held in Palo Alto in January 2002, followed by the one in Bangalore in February 2003," he added.
More Stories on : Telecommunications | Security
Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page
|
Stories in this Section |
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | Sportstar | Frontline | The Hindu eBooks | The Hindu Images | Home |
Copyright © 2004, The
Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu Business Line
|