The total number of mobile subscriptions in the country now stands at 115.12 crore (as on October 31), the Parliament was informed on Wednesday.
Out of 6,44,131 villages in the country, around 6,23,622 villages now have mobile coverage, Minister of State for Communications and Rural Development, Dr Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani, told the Lok Sabha in a written reply to a question.
Mobile coverage for inhabited uncovered villages is provided by the government and TSPs in a phased manner, he added.
Under DBN, the government is implementing various schemes and projects for the expansion of telecom connectivity through the installation of mobile towers in rural, remote, and hilly areas of the country, said the minister.
Besides, the project BharatNet, earlier named National Optical Fiber Network being funded by the Digital Bharat Nidhi is being implemented on a phase-wise basis providing broadband connectivity to all GPs of the country.
The revised BharatNet Programme was okayed by the Cabinet to upgrade the already existing network of BharatNet Phase-I and Phase-II, besides creating a network in almost 42,000 left out gram panchayats, its operation and maintenance for 10 years and usage at the overall cost of Rs 1,39,579 crore, said Dr Pemmasani.
Last week, the government reported that mobile network coverage in rural India has nearly touched 97 per cent and at least 6,14,564 villages are covered with 4G mobile connectivity.
Dr Pemmasani, in a reply to a question in Rajya Sabha, said that under the Pradhan Mantri Janjati Adivasi Nyaya Maha Abhiyan of the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, 4,543 particularly vulnerable tribal group habitations have been identified as mobile uncovered and out of these, 1,136 PVTG habitations have been covered with mobile connectivity.
Meanwhile, with 5G services presently available in 779 of the country's 783 districts (as of 31 October), more than 4.6 lakh 5G Base Transceiver Stations (BTSs) have been set up in the country so far, the minister mentioned.
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