India’s state owned telecom service provider Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has signed an agreement with Power Grid Corporation of India Limited (PGCIL) to improve the telecommunications connectivity to the States of North East Region including Sikkim.
The agreement was signed at Bharat Sanchar Bhawan, Janpath, New Delhi, in the presence of Sh. A. N. Rai, Director, BSNL Board and Sh. Ashwani Jain, COO (Telecom), PGCIL. The agreement envisages provisioning of bandwidth on optical fibre media laid over the high tension electric transmission network of PGCIL.
Total 34 links comprising of multiple 10 Gbps capacity telecom circuits will be commissioned. This will provide redundancy to existing network of BSNL which comprises of Optical Fibre media laid underground along National / State Highways. The agreement will be effective for a period of 10 years.
Total bandwidth capacity to be provided as part of the said agreement will be 810 Gbps, covering 20 important locations in NE Region including Sikkim. To provide the bandwidth, PGCIL and BSNL will deploy high capacity DWDM telecom equipments in their respective telecom network.
These telecom links will become operational in next 12 to 18 months time period. After completion of the proposed connectivity, the reliability of telecom services of North East Region including Sikkim will improve substantively, which will result in improved Broadband Internet services and other telecom services being provided by BSNL to the Citizens of North East Region and Government Agencies.
