9000 villages to be wireless-linked with State Data Centres : Jayant Patil

Mumbai, March 6, 2008: Mr. Jayantrao Patil, Hon’ble Minister for Finance & Planning, Government of Maharashtra, said that the State Government has planned to link 9000 villages with the State Data Centre through wireless connectivity soon.

Mr. Patil was addressing the inaugural session of the two-day 6th International Conference on “Communications Convergence - Wireless Communication in Today’s Age”, organized by Indian Merchants’ Chamber at Hotel Hilton Towers, Mumbai on March 6.

Mr. Patil said that the State Government had recently connected the treasuries at all taluka centres with state headquarters. “This has enabled the Government to monitor and regulate the cash flows at a pre-determined rate,” he said.

Among other speakers, who addressed the inaugural session, included : Dr. Vijay P Bhatkar, Chairman, ETH Research Lab, Mr. Gopal Das, Director, Planning & New Services, BSNL, Mr. Dewang Neralla, Director-Technology, Financial Technologies (India) Ltd. and Mr. Vijay Mukhi, Managing Director, Vijay Mukhi's Computer Institute.

IMC President Mr. Niraj Bajaj welcomed them. Mr. Nanik Rupani, Chairman, Electronics & Telecommunications Committee, IMC explained the significance of this annual conference.

Mr. Jayantrao Patil also announced that the State was implementing a pilot project for releasing the payments directly to the bank accounts of recipients. In a similar way, it was also launching another pilot project for tax collection and also disbursal of dues through banks.

“Very soon, we are setting up a website for direct and realtime communications with pensioners,” he said. It had also planned to set up a website soon for enabling common people to track the pace of their applications in the government corridors.

Mr. Dewang Neralla said that his company, Financial Technologies, set up the online working facilities at BSE and MCX by using the power of communication for democratizing the markets.

Dr. Vijay P Bhatkar said the communication convergence was happening at many levels - the level of networks, services, operations, terminals etc. “Of the total of two billion mobile phones in the world, India had 250 million,” he said.

Mr. Gopal Das said that BSNL’s scheme for using Wireless Broadband Technology to reach out to the villages was in an advanced stage of finalization.

Mr. Vijay Mukhi said that the Conference would mainly focus on the wireless technology, training of skilled hands adept with that technology, the checking cyber crime, and the future directions of communication convergence.

IMC President Mr. Niraj Bajaj said that the last mile access was one of the major constraints in the growth of broadband connectivity. “The greatest challenge is to achieve the 20 million broadband subscribers target by 2010, which is only 3.13 million today,” he said.

Mr. M N Chaini, President-elect, IMC who proposed the vote of thanks, said that the subsequent sessions of the conference – both later today and tomorrow – would be highly significant, with a lot of take-home value.