The Department of Telecom is going in for a complete change in strategy to roll out the ₹20,000-crore National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN). The project, which aims to provide broadband services to 2.5 lakh villages, has barely progressed due to procedural delays and lack of coordination among the public sector companies executing the rollout.

The new plan involves dividing the country into different zones and outsourcing the fibre rollout to private agencies. The DoT was forced to rethink the strategy after the Prime Minister’s Office advanced the deadline to connect all the villages to March 2016 from December 2016.

“If the project is to be completed in time then we will have to scale up the pace of work 30-40 times. A total of 10 lakh km of fibre has been laid in the country over 20 years. NOFN requires an additional 6 lakh km of fibre to be laid in 18 months,” said a DoT official. As of now three PSUs — BSNL, RailTel and Powergrid — are laying the optical fibre. The procurement and tendering for equipment and fibre are done centrally through a special purpose vehicle called Bharat Broadband Networks Ltd. Locations and village blocks have been picked randomly leading to discrete geographical coverage.

Under the new plan, DoT is looking to divide the country into 6-8 zones, each comprising 3-4 States. Each zone will be awarded to one private vendor on a turnkey basis with incentives for good performance and penalties for missing targets. The other option being looked at by the DoT is combining implementation of the optical fibre project with the Government User Network, for which the Government has earmarked another ₹5,000 crore. This network is meant for Government-to-citizen services.

However, DoT officials said that even with the new plan it would be difficult to meet the target set by the PMO.

“Globally, a number of countries have rolled out optical fibre networks, and taken 5-10 years. Australia, for example, is rolling out 2 lakh kilometres of cable at a cost of $34.7 billion over a 10-year period. Even that is expected to be delayed till 2024,” the DoT official said.

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