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Faster Internet Might Be On The Way; Telecom Secretary Says India Might Adopt 5G By June This Year
A person chats on a mobile phone. (FEDERICO PARRA/AFP/Getty Images)
A Department of Telecom (DoT)-led panel is in the process of rolling out a roadmap for rolling fifth-generation telephony services (5G) in India by June this year, reports The Indian Express. The panel is looking at all the aspects of rolling of 5G services including spectrum policy, regulatory works and pilot programmes.
Along with the world, India too has planned for a 5G rollout by 2020. DoT secretary Aruna Sundararajan said that the industry, startups and academia need to work in tandem to ensure a successful rollout to support faster broadband, better support for Internet of Things (IoT) and mission critical services.
The DoT has constituted a high-level forum last September comprising of the secretaries of the departments of telecom, information technology (IT), and science and technology apart from stakeholders from the industry and academic experts. The forum was tasked with developing a roadmap as well as evaluate and approve proposals in the field.
The Centre has on many an occasion reiterated that it wanted to adopt 5G standards simultaneously with the rest of the world to prevent India from being left behind in the global ecosystem. India had a delayed launch for 3G and 4G services. While 3G was adopted globally in the early 2000s, state run Mahanagar Telecom Nigam Limited (MTNL) and Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) rolled out their services in 2008 and 2009 respectively while other operators launched theirs in 2010. Bharti Airtel was the first to launch 4G services in 2012 while Jio launched voice-over-LTE (VoLTE) services in 2016.
3G services support an average speed of 3.1 to 7.2 megabits per second (mbps) while 4G services can handle faster speeds, ranging between 100 to 200 mbps. 5G services are touted to handle speeds of up to 20 gigabits per second (gbps).
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