India to invest $30 billion for 4G, 5G connectivity to every village

India will invest $30 billion for ensuring last mile accessibility to 4G and 5G services in every village, said telecom minister Ashwini Vaishnaw at Global Fintech Fest on Thursday.

“We are investing close to $30 billion to ensure last-mile network accessibility for 4G and 5G in every village across the country. So far we have been able to reach out to over 1.5 lakh gram panchayats. We are now building a highway - creating a whole ecosystem of village entrepreneurs, channelizing the energies of youngsters to take good quality, high-speed data connectivity to every village in the country while making them a part of the growth journey,” he said.

“We have tested this model and approximately 80,000 new connections are now being facilitated every month,” he added.

Sharing his views on the digital regulatory framework he said that telecom was at the foundation of Digital India and the Prime Minister had given the department a clear mandate to overhaul India’s digital regulatory framework such that it is globally benchmarked and endorses global competitiveness.

“We are currently looking at 3-4 legislations cumulatively inclusive of the new telecom bill, the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill and the IT Act of 2000 to create an interactive framework in which the industry's concerns are addressed by the government and government's concerns are duly taken into consideration by the industry. Technological navigation has to be modulated such that the interests of end users are protected,” he said.

Vaishnaw summed up three core focal areas in fintech for the government which comprised building a robust digital infrastructure and a digital regulatory framework, along with social inclusion and the societal imperatives around it.