The challenges of fiberisation ahead of India’s 5G deployment

Source: This post is created based on the article “The challenges of fiberisation ahead of India’s 5G deployment” published in The Hindu on 25^th July 2022.

Syllabus: GS Paper 3 – Science and technology – Communication and Information Technology

News: Prime Minister of India in his 2020 Independence Day speech, laid out the vision to connect every village in the country with Optical Fiber Cable (OFC) in 1,000 days. Also, India is preparing to auction off about 72 Ghz of airwaves to rollout 5G services in the country. However, the fiberization is required to rollout such an infrastructure.

What is fiberisation and its significance?

The process of connecting radio towers with each other via optical fibre cables is called fiberization.

It helps provide full utilisation of network capacity, carry large amounts of data, and aid in providing additional bandwidth.

It provides a stronger backhaul support. The backhaul is a component of the larger transport that is responsible for carrying data across the network. It represents the part of the network that connects the core of the network to the edge.

What is the status of fiberisation in India?

At present, in India, only 33% of the towers are fiberized. It is very low compared to the 65%-70% in South Korea and 80%-90% in the U.S., Japan and China.

India’s fibre kilometer (fkm) per capita is just .09 compared to 1.35 in Japan, 1.34 in the U.S. and 1.3 in China. Ideally, a country needs 1.3 km of fibre per capita to ensure good fiberisation.

The tower sites which are connected via fibre are called fibre point of presence (POP). Currently, India’s fibre POP can just handle data at one to five Gbps speed.

What are the challenges to fiberisation in India?

First, India requires about ₹2.2 lakh crore of investment to help fiberise 70% towers. Another ₹2.5 lakh crore will be needed to set up 15 lakh towers in the next four years.

Second, to connect every village in the country with optical fiber cable (OFC) in 1,000 days, cables must be laid around 3.6 times the current average speed of 350 km a day.

Third, Indian Telegraph RoW Rules 2016 aim to incorporate nominal one-time compensation and uniform procedure for establishment of Overground Telegraph Line (OTL) anywhere in the country. While all States/UTs are required to implement these rules. The implementation in all states is not in complete alignment to the central rules. Furthermore, several districts and local bodies are following their own by-laws. Also, many central Ministries like Ministry of Environment and Forests, Ministry of Railways, Ministry of Defense etc. are following their own departmental rules.

Other government initiatives for fiberisation

In October 2021, the DoT revised the RoW rules, making it easier to install aerial optical fibre cable in the country. This can enable infrastructure providers to deploy cables overhead via street light poles and traffic light posts.

DoT’s GatiShakti Sanchar online portal will enable centralisation of RoW approvals for telecom infrastructure projects, including 5G.