Jul. 3, 2009 (The Hindu Business Line) --

The Railway Ministry has appointed Mr Pitroda as the head of an expert committee for suggesting schemes to use its optical fibre cable network commercially.

The Railways has about 30,000 route km of optical fibre cable running along its tracks in many parts of the country.

The cable network is under RailTel Corporation of India, which has taken infrastructure provider category licence from the Department of Telecom.

Announcing the move, Ms Mamata Banerjee, Minister of Railways, said: “I propose to constitute an expert committee, headed by Mr Sam Pitroda, the key person behind the telecom revolution in the country. The Committee will suggest further innovations to utilise the optical fibre cables network of the Railways and take information technology to remote areas.”
Expansion plans

As on March 2008, RailTel had revenues of Rs 213 crore. The company is planning to increase its optical cable network to 40,000 route km.

RailTel is currently providing services to major telecom players such as AirTel, Vodafone (NYSE:VOD) , Aircel, Idea Cellular (OOTC:IDEAF) and Reliance Telecom. RailTel is also providing services to Internet service providers, electronic media, MSO cable operators.

It is also targeting the corporate virtual private network.

The optical fibre cables can also be utilised to reach out to various e-governance projects to the rural areas.

The Universal Services Obligation fund has floated a scheme aimed at rolling out a broadband network in the rural areas.

The cable network owned by RailTel could be utilised for this purpose.
Little progress

The decision to set up the optical fibre cable network along railway track was first mooted by Ms Banerjee in the 2001-02 Railway Budget.

According to Ms Banerjee, there was little progress in these eight years and therefore the decision to rope in Mr Pitroda was taken.