Date:05/05/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/05/05/stories/2008050555570800.htm

Andhra Pradesh

One more feather in BSNL’s cap

Special Correspondent

VISAKHAPATNAM: With more and more people, irrespective of their age, are becoming net savvy and prefer net for their day to day transactions, the demand for BSNL broadband has increased in the city.

Thanks to the arrival and installation of more equipment, the Visakhapatnam telecom district has provided a record number of broadband connections in the last five months, said its General Manager P. Nagaraju.

Talking to The Hindu, he said despite the department is providing nearly 1,000 broadband connections per month the demand is still increasing as there are at least 1,200 applicants in the waiting list. “We hope to reduce the waiting time as early as possible and expect the figure (total connections) to touch 50,000 mark by March 2009.” He pointed out that the number of BSNL broadband connections was just 2,700 in January 2006. It moved up to 5,500 in June2007and crossed 10,000 mark in late October. Now it is 14,600.

In fact the net capacity is almost full (pending arrival of new equipment) in Seethammadhara, CRR, Kirlampudi and Dabagarden telephone exchanges, he said.

To woo more domestic and commercial customers new schemes have been introduced. Under flexi plan the domestic customers could use net for unlimited hours (beyond 2GB) just by paying Rs.750 per month.

For commercial customers a combo offer is introduced under which 6 GB net usage and 175 landline free calls under one India plan are allowed per month for just Rs.1,000 per month. Otherwise such customers will be paying Rs.700 per month for broadband up to 4 GB and Rs.180 for land line (only 50 free calls allowed).