IT minister Dayanidhi Maran with President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam in New Delhi on Thursday. (AFP)

New Delhi, Dec. 14: Those who find Internet speed of 256 kbps a trifle slow have reason to cheer. The government is planning to soon provide unlimited Internet speeds.

Come January, Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) would provide Internet speed of 2 mbps for its broadband subscribers.

“Starting with 1 mbps, we would upgrade the Internet broadband speed to reach a minimum of 2 mbps by early next year,” said A.K. Sinha, chairman of BSNL.

IT and communications minister Dayananidhi Maran said as the country was moving towards an era of unlimited bandwidth, the Centre would “re-write” the broadband policy, bidding adieu to 256 kbps speed limit and providing greater speeds.

Speaking at the inauguration of the India Telecom 2006 summit, Maran added, “Maximising broadband coverage is a challenge for the telecom industry, which is targeting 9 million broadband connections by 2007.”

Maran said BSNL was targeting 5 million connections by 2007, providing an impetus to the broadband sector which boasts of 3 million subscribers.

The minister said the government would invest $20 million for the growth of the telecom sector in the country. He hoped that all schools, health institutions and panchayats would have broadband by 2008.

Telecom PSU Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL) is working on aggressive schemes to offer bandwidth at a greater speed of 2mbps and would unveil the plan in January, said MTNL sources.

Private player Bharti Airtel is also believed to be sprucing up its infrastructure to provide broadband speed at 1 mbps and higher.

Broadband Internet access is a high data-transmission Internet connection where speeds can go up to 30 mega bits per second (mbps).

Mobile connections

The government today set a target to more than triple the number of mobile connections to 500 million, provide handsets for Rs 1,000 and increase broadband speed in its ‘Vision 2010’ for the telecom sector.

While talking about network expansion, the minister said, “The aim is to have 250 million telephone connections by 2007. By 2010, we aim to have 500 million mobiles.”

The country has about 185 million connections at present. This includes about 45 million fixed-line phones and 140 million mobile subscribers.

With regard to the geographical coverage, Maran said there would be 85 per cent mobile coverage of the country by 2007 and 90 per cent by 2010.