Communications minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Thursday inaugurated 5G services by Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel in Odisha. The services have been started in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack as of now and the entire state will be covered by 5G over the next two years.The launch in Odisha follows Vaishnaw’s statement in October last year wherein he said that at least four cities of Odisha will get 5G by March.
“We have launched 5G in Odisha two months before our target. In the first three months of launch, nowhere in the world has there been a rapid rollout of 5G,” Vaishnaw said at the inauguration of 5G services at SOA University in Bhubaneswar.Both the telecom operators Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel also showcased their next-generation 5G-driven use cases at the launch event.Odisha, which currently ranks among the lowest states in the teledensity, has also been allocated a Rs 5,600 crore package for telecom connectivity.
The package will be used to deploy 5,000 towers across 7,000 villages in the state over the next two years to improve network coverage and quality. “From the package, today we have inaugurated 100 4G towers and month-on-month, we will improve the coverage,” Vaishnaw said, adding that the government is also focusing on fibre connectivity in the villages across the state.
Speaking on the occasion, telecom secretary K Rajaraman said, “features offered by 5G have unraveled a whole gamut of people centric possibilities like telemedicine, live distance education, smart city applications, industrial automation, etc”.Among other key highlights of the 5G launch in Odisha, Reliance Jio has entered a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with SOA University for enabling research and use cases on 5G technology. Besides, the government through the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) will also set up technology parks to develop skilled manpower and promote innovation among startups and students.
The government will set up software centres at eight locations: Bhubaneswar, Rourkela, Jajpur, Barampur, Balasore, Angul, Koraput, and Sambalpur by December 31. “Soon, the True 5G network will expand rapidly across the length and breadth of Odisha, covering the cities of Rourkela, Berhampur, Puri, Sambalpur, and Balasore in Odisha by February 2023 and reach to every tehsil and taluk of Odisha by December 2023,” a spokesperson of Reliance Jio said.
As per the industry estimates, the companies have installed around 36,000 5G base stations across 25 states/union territories, with priority on states like Maharashtra, Delhi, Gujarat, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka.On a proposal by telecom operators’ association for letting telcos charge OTT communication service providers for using their infrastructure, Vaishnaw said, “it’s a very complex discussion and that’s why we have uploaded a consultation paper. Trai is also working on it. These are the things, which can not be decided in one day or in one discussion”.