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All rules on new telecom law to be notified in 180 days: minister Scindia
- On the bond guarantee for MTNL, the minister said while monetization of assets will take place to pay off liabilities, in the interim, the sovereign guarantee bonds will be good as the government stands behind those models and there will be no default.
All rules and provisions of the new telecom Act will be notified within the next 180 days, telecom minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said on Thursday at the launch of the India Mobile Congress.
Last month, the government notified 39 provisions of the Telecommunications Act 2023 related to taking temporary possession of telecom networks in the interest of public safety or during emergencies, penalties on more than allowed SIM ownership, intercepting messages and right of way for telecom infrastructure. However, the more contentious rules dealing with administrative allocation of satellite spectrum, mandatory biometric verification of users by telecom companies and a smoother telecom dispute resolution mechanism, are yet to be notified.
The telecom department will also set up a performance management unit (PMU) comprising Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), C-DoT, Tejas Networks and TCS, which will set daily targets for setting up the networks for launch of 4G services by the state-run telecom player, the minister said. Scindia said that he and the telecom secretary will monitor these targets.
“Let me guarantee, we have the 100,000 RANs (radio access networks). With all the players together, we're forming a PMU which has been mandated to set daily targets,” he said.
Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DoT) has developed its own 4G/5G stack and is deploying it with the help of BSNL that gave out tenders to a TCS-led consortium last year. The government has since maintained that the telecom company will launch 4G services by December 2024.
The minister added that BSNL's 4G stack should be seen as a national pride since the PSU chose the harder path of going in for indigenised products, instead of opting for existing technologies.
On the bond guarantee for Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL), the minister said that monetization of assets will take place to pay off the liabilities. While assets are monetized and as some bonds become due, the sovereign guarantee bonds will stand good as the government stands behind those models and there will be no default, he added.
On Thursday, MTNL said that the government deposited ₹92 crore to clear dues of bond interest for the state-owned firm. This was after last week when the carrier said that it was not able to fund the escrow account for the payment of semi-annual interest on the series VIII-A bonds due to insufficient funds.
At the event, the minister launched two schemes, while noting that telecom firms have rolled out 5G networks rapidly, the next target will be to take the lead in 6G.
One of the schemes, for reimbursement of the testing and certification charges for start-ups and micro and small enterprises with an outlay of ₹25 crore, is aimed at easing financial burden, fostering domestic manufacturing, attracting investments, and enhancing exports. The scheme will reimburse up to ₹50 lakh per entity for testing and certification costs essential for product quality and market access. Startups will receive 75% reimbursement, micro- enterprises 60%, and small enterprises 50%, reflecting DoT's commitment to equitable support for growth and innovation in the telecom industry.
The second initiative, an MoU for training of department of telecom officers on cyber security between IIT Jammu and National Telecommunications Institute for Policy Research, Innovation and Training, will be aimed towards training officers in advance cyber security tools and solutions, helping them to become cyber experts.
The programme will include core technical training by leading institutions and industry in cyber security, that will increase in-depth understanding of this field for personnel, who will, in turn, train many others. There will be an extended 6-month hybrid (in campus and online) training to the selected 30 officers along with partner institutions that are leading in this field. These 30 officers have undergone Phase-I training at IIT Kanpur and Phase II training at C-DAC Pune. The training will be in depth in the area of networks and system security, mobile device security, IoT and cloud security, digital forensics, dark web and threat intelligence to name a few. The high-end industrial trainings will also be imparted by the partners like Quick Heal Technologies Ltd, Data Security Council of India, GMR Aero Academy, and NIIT University. The training will not only have in-depth theoretical and practical understanding but real-life visits to security operations centres, cyber test beds and leading deployments of cyber security throughout the nation.
The minister added that BSNL's 4G stack should be seen as national pride, as the telecom company preferred the harder path of using indigenised products, instead of opting for existing technologies. "It was easy for BSNL to pick up...existing technologies and do what others are doing but our prime minister has said that India must not only be a supplier of services, but we must become a supplier of products so you (BSNL) chose the harder route of developing own 4G stack in India," he said.
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Business NewsNewsAll rules on new telecom law to be notified in 180 days: minister Scindia
First Published:18 Jul 2024, 10:22 PM IST
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