TRAI asks govt to fix minimum broadband speed at 2 mbps, address AGR issue for cable ops, reimburse rural broadband subscribers

New Delhi: The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has recommended several measures to the government to promote internet connectivity and increase connection speed.

The Telecom Regulatory Body in its recommendations on "Roadmap To Promote Broadband Connectivity And Enhanced Broadband Speed" said that the government should fix minimum broadband speed at 2 megabit per second.

"Definition of broadband has been reviewed and the minimum download speed for broadband conectivity revised upward from the present 512kbps to 2mbps. Based on download speed, fixed broadband has been categorised into 3 different categories --Basic, Fast and Super-fast," said Trai.

The regulator has suggested these three categories of broadband service- basic with minimum download speed of 2 mbps and less than 50 mbps, fast broadband between 50-300 mbps download speed and super fast capability of delivering greater than 300 mbps speed.

The Telecom regulator also recommended adoption of adjusted gross revenue as defined by it earlier to bring cable TV operators in the plan. It has recommended implementation of direct benefit transfer for accelerating growth of fixed line broadband services in rural areas by reimbursing up to Rs 200 per month per subscriber for their broadband connection charges.

In order to encourage Cable Operators, registered under Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995, to provide broadband services, issues relating to computation of Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) for Cable Operators need to be addressed on priority. To address this issue, the Authority has already given its recommendations to the government," Trai recommended.

Trai recommended DoT to make available spectrum used for backend connectivity on demand and in time bound manner to the telecom operators for enhancing broadband speed.