Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd's goal to reach the one million subscriber base target in broadband services by 2005 end looks remote if numbers are any indication.
According to K B Brahmadathan, Chief General Manager, BSNL Chennai Telephones, BSNL currently has 2.5 lakh broadband connections across the country.
This is just a quarter of the targeted one million. But the top BSNL official is hopeful of reaching the goal. In Tamil Nadu, a key telecom circle, BSNL achieved less than half the targeted one lakh broadband connections.
Brahmadathan told
UNI that delay in procurement of imported modems and customs hassles were impeding efforts to attain the target.
Currently, BSNL has 45,000 broadband connections in Tamil Nadu with Chennai alone accounting for 36,000.The CGM was confident of getting another 65,000 into BSNL's fold before the target year ended.
He also said the response for broadband connectivity had been tremendous in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkata compared to other cities.
Though broadband offered very distinct advantages like fast uploads, downloads and browsing speed, local hitches remained, BSNL sources
said.
A single broadband connection takes took three hours for activation due to technical reasons as against the normal five minutes, the sources added.
''There is practical difficulty. It takes at least three hours to install one broadband connection. Version mismatch, Ethernet and NEC cards installation are not taken into account when providing broadband connectivity,'' they added.
Only three to five broadband connections were possible as most customers were unaware of connectivity requirements.
Brahmadathan said sometimes even operating systems had to be reconfigured for availing broadband facility.
Though a pre-configured modem is now available at the exchange, this facility was not being utilised. Besides customers did not read the terms and conditions thoroughly and youngsters, especially, do not spend adequate time on carefully vetting the form.
However, BSNL has been clocking impressive numbers in mobile phones with 1.5 lakh connections given during October 2005 alone.
Half of this was accounted for by Chennai. Brahmadathan said BSNL currently has 15 lakh mobile connections with 4.5 lakh connections in the city.
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