Ministerial Group for rural broadband rollout

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The Government has formed an Inter-Ministerial Group for planning the rollout of broadband infrastructure in rural areas with support from the Universal Services Obligation (USO) fund.

The group, comprising Ministries of Health, Home, Human Resource Development, Panchayati Raj and IT, will discuss how the various Government Departments and agencies spread across the country can promote the usage of broadband.

The various Ministries will indicate their requirement for broadband infrastructure, which in turn will enable telecom operators to build their business plan while bidding for the USO fund-initiated rural broadband project. The Government has set a target of adding 6.5 million broadband subscribers in 2007, of which 4.5 million are expected to be provided by BSNL