The Hindu : Mobile PCOs on long-distance trains, buses planned

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Feb 16, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu-Chennai

Mobile PCOs on long-distance trains, buses planned

By N. Ravi Kumar

CHENNAI FEB. 15. The proposed launch of cellular service by the Chennai Telephones will pave the way for introduction of PCOs on many long-distance trains and buses from and to the city.

Its GSM (Global System for Mobile communication) service, one of the long-pending projects of the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), will be a vital component of the telecom behemoth's cellular network in the State and facilitate in the setting of the mobile public telephones.

With the Chennai Telephones planning to extend GSM coverage on all major rail and road (highways) routes within its area of operation, the BSNL is expected to become a dominant player in the cellular market.

"Our cellular subscribers will get uninterrupted connectivity while undertaking long-distance travel as base tower stations (BTS) for the service would be established on important routes linking the city", claims S.S. Iyer, Chief General Manager of Chennai Telephones.

The BSNL entity is planning to set up 113 BTS for the cellular service and proposes to launch it by March-end. To a query on the apprehensions in some quarters about the project getting further delayed, he said, "we will introduce the service as soon as 40 BTS gets ready and continue adding more". About 51 of the installations are on non-BSNL sites.

Motorola, the official equipment provider for Chennai Telephones' GSM project, is also the licensee for installing the BSNL network in the rail route between Chennai and Bangalore. Other popular rail routes such as the Chennai-Tirupati, Chennai-Vijayawada and almost all major routes within the State will be covered. The BSNL already unveiled its plans to bring all the major towns in the State under its cellular service within the next few months.

The mobile PCOs, Mr. Iyer explains, will be a key facet of the GSM service from the stable of the BSNL and initially introduced in the important trains on the routes and later in long distances buses in the State.

The BSNL recently unveiled the concept of mobile PCOs (employing the Wireless in Local Loop technology) for rural areas, which would be provided in association with the Department of Posts.

A few private telecom service providers also launched WLL mobile PCOs in the city.

Meanwhile, the GSM project moved one step ahead when tenders submitted by prospective distributors of the cellular service were opened on Friday. The cellular service of Chennai Telephones - the fourth in the city - would be GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) and multimedia messaging enabled and would operate on 900 MHz frequency band.

Therefore, it could be accessed on mono-band handsets.

"Though the value-added facilities will be introduced gradually, we would be supplying our subscribers with the 32K card", he said.

The BSNL entity also proposed to advertise on the BTS that will be installed in "secure premises".

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