NATIONAL TELECOM POLICY. Industry, analysts give the draft Telecom Policy a thumbs up

The much-awaited draft on National Telecom Policy, named National Digital Communications Policy, 2018, released for public comments has been welcomed by the telecom industry and analysts, who believe that early finalisation and implementation would be beneficial for all.

Given the sector’s capital-intensive nature, the Policy aims to attract long-term, high quality and sustainable investments.

The policy talks of attracting investment up to $100 billion by 2022, but who would invest at a time when operators are struggling and that also has a debt of around ₹7.8 lakh crore.

Driving emerging tech

“The huge opportunity arising from one-billion connections, 1.3 billion population, six-lakh villages, smart cities, etc will drive emerging technologies like analytics, cloud and Artificial Intelligence to unlock a lot of value for all sectors and hence the long-term outlook is attractive for funding,” Hemant Joshi, Partner at Deloitte India, told BusinessLine .

According to the Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI), bringing down total taxes and levies, currently at about 30 per cent to below 10 per cent will be important for attracting investment targets outlined in the policy.

COAI said the telecom industry would like the policy to be finalised and implemented by July-end. The document, which highlights broadband for all and high-speed Internet for all, has been welcomed by the industry veterans.

“The policy is committed to provide high-speed Internet to all by various initiatives such as BharatNet, GramNet, NagarNet and Jan Wi-Fi, which will ultimately help end-users,” said Joshi at Deloitte.

He said broadband is slowly becoming a basic amenity for the citizens and by various initiatives government is trying to provide high-speed connectivity at affordable prices.

 

 

 

Broadband coverage

The universal broadband coverage of 50 Mbps to every citizen will provide high quality broadband as well as access to information and government services. Wi-Fi services will help the internet penetrate to remote areas while satellite technology can bring new solutions to the communication sector, he said.

“The draft policy is a forward looking document and if all the proposals are met then there will be a lot of opportunities in this sector. If the government rationalise the taxes and levies in the sector, the investments will also come which would help connecting the rural areas,” Tilak Raj Dua, Director-General at Towers and Infrastructure Providers’ Association (TAIPA), said.

According to TV Ramachandran, President, Broadband India Forum, the draft policy is a consumer-centric policy with the basic aim of ensuring that the advantages of the new technologies are accessible to all citizens equitably while securing them against existing and emerging threats.

However, he said the current situation of Wi-Fi hotspots is not encouraging at all.

“Based on the global average today of 1 in 150, India should have at least 8 million public Wi-Fi hotspots. It is heartening to see that the policy rightly focusses on deploying five million public Wi-Fi Hotspots by 2020 and 10 million by 2022,” he said.

Spectrum management

Referring to the ‘efficient spectrum utilisation and management’ in the policy, Ramachandran said that there is obviously much to be done to improve the effectiveness of our auctions and the auction design has to change significantly to meet public policy objectives.

“Hence, well-defined formulae based on sound assumptions will not only increase transparency in the system but also will empower the government officials with the ability to take the right decision,” he added.