What Broadband can do for India?

What Broadband can do for India?

Over the past few months, there has been intense speculation and excitement over broadband. Few established players like Sify absolutely screwed up the definition of what broadband is. For Sify users it became marginally better than dial up. At times even worse! Current definition of broadband (as per recommendations from TRAI) applies to always on connection at minimum defined speeds of 256 kbps. However, this was more in realization with the current infrastructure that India has. Download speeds of over and above 2 Mbps are usually taken as a broadband connection. However, it is an approximate indicator of what is possible. While the world moves in towards Mbps, we are still in the kbps era. A small step is a small leap anyway for India!

What broadband can do? I have tried to compile a list of possible scenarios and the readers are welcome to share their ideas on that. Please note that this is suggestive and not an exhaustive compilation.

Broadband is means of fast data transfer over the traditional copper wires or the cable wires that get the cable TV in your homes. This is called a CAT 5 cable. The best mode of transfer for the data transfer is the optic fiber. However, despite falling costs, it is costly to set up and maintain.

For a power user, one who is always connected online, broadband connection gives almost a limitless supply of software through file sharing. The peer to peer (p2p) networks are best described as forms of digital communism. Further discussion is out of scope here though. Broadband helps is fast data transfers that these networks need for file sharing. Entertainment is a big business now. TV shows and live web casts are possible through broadband. This means that one can record a program of your choice and playback whenever feasible. This concept is taking US by storm with the development of TiVo. With the current speeds, this seems to be far-fetched idea in India. I believe that Reliance has collaborated with Microsoft to get this technology to India. The concept would take time to get off the ground.

However, the real broadband can potentially transform India into a knowledge-based economy. The movement towards a paperless office would be a reality. E-governance would soon happen. This means that the government offices would be interlinked with a central server and requesting files over the network. This distinct possibility has already been set up in Andhra Pradesh. The entire land records have been digitized and set up on the network. This removes any scope for ambiguity. ITC also set up its e-chaupals network linking through VSATs. This has had an amazing effect on the local economy, as the farmers are able to get a higher price for their produce.

The connectivity can do wonders for self-employment. With falling prices for computers and laptops, working at home is a distant possibility. This is particularly useful in metropolitan cities where increasing traffic jams take a huge amount of time and effort in commuting from one end to another. Work could be moved from one part of the city or country through networks. Employment through setting up of cyber cafes has revolutionized the way Indians access electronic resources.

Health care remains one area that could potentially benefit from broadband. Regular web casts of continued medical education helps the doctors to update themselves without leaving their practices. That too, in the comfort of their homes. There is a pilot project in United Kingdom, which monitors the asthma and diabetes management using web cameras over broadband networks. This has the potential to reduce the caregiver costs and hopefully reduce the burden of the doctors in the resource intensive settings. E-Healthcare can help doctors sitting in far flung areas to have a second opinion in case of complicated management. The first initiative was again taken by Apollo hospitals as means of outreach in the far-flung rural health centers. Traditionally far-flung villages have been left out of the outreach of health care initiatives. Broadband reach can effectively mitigate the problem to a large extent.

Broadband can of course help one to update about the latest advances in medicine. Increasingly resources are being freed for the developing countries, which mean that it is possible to update with the best in the field. I have personally found my own horizon expanding while interacting with doctors from other countries.

Businesses tend to benefit the most. Trading online in stock markets and up to minute news and tracking becomes a reality, broadband remains imperative. Industrial units needing to set up networking to track inventory or implement virtual networking tend to maximize their profits on their investments. Of course the BPO units employing the maximum number of fresh graduates. Even if the model is flawed, yet it is generating employment.

Another fascinating development is Voice over Internet protocol. Vonage in US is offering traditional calls over broadband networks where plans include unlimited calls across US for a flat monthly fee. Cisco India has recently started offering VoIP across the company’s network. Of course, they need to be connected to broadband networks. The icing on the cake is the p2p VoIP called as Skype. It has challenged the traditional phone networks. It offers free unlimited calls to any other Skype user across the world. This is an excellent avenue for saving on those international calls. VoIP has progressed tremendously and over the broadband networks, the voice clarity is almost similar to the ones over the traditional network.

As I mentioned broadband access has untold benefits. However, it so frustrating when authorities restrict access to the same according to what they think is right. It is not the matter of time though. Already 50+ years have elapsed and we are still bound with the developing country tag. If the popular perception about India is not as an IT superpower or that India aspiring to have a greater role in the world affairs, then perhaps I am willing to be insulted in the name of Internet access. High prices should not be a dampener for a broadband revolution that has to happen now! I came across somewhere on the forums where a Japanese advertisement had been translated. It said “Still stuck at 56 Mbps? Move up”!

Where are we in India stuck up at?

Discuss on: Sify Broadband, Tata Indicom, Airtel Broadband, Reliance Broadband, MTNL - BSNL Broadband, Dial Up, Others

This post was submitted by Dr. Abhishek Puri on the Broadband Blog on Techwhack.