Center Looking to Connect 40 crore People in 3 Years: Rajeev Chandrasekhar

The Union Minister of State was speaking at the inauguration ceremony of an internet exchange in Uttarakhand. The internet exchange was 10th of its kind in the country from NIXI or the National Internet Exchange of India.

The internet exchange will help improve the quality of the internet in the northern state. Speaking of the next internet exchange, Chandrasekhar said that Nainital will host the next one. At the same event, BJP Rajya Sabha MP Anil Baluni urged Chandrasekhar to set up an internet exchange in every district of Uttarakhand.

For now, NIXI has plans to set up many such nodes across tier-2 and tier-3 cities soon, so that the internet ecosystem in the country can get a boost. Basically, such an internet exchange will also improve speeds and revenues.

Calling the internet "the future", he said that the government has been able to create a corruption-free environment in the country. He further said, "We have 80 crore people in the country who are connected with the internet but there are 40 crore people who are still unconnected. Our target is to connect these 40 crore people with the internet in the next three years".

Highlighting the exceptional growth in the electronics and IT sector, Chandrasekhar said that the sector saw 8 lakh new jobs. What's more, every month, the sector saw two new unicorns since the start of 2021. Since the start of this year, the government has announced an array of PLI schemes. These PLI schemes have seen government incentivize manufacturing electronic goods, such as laptops.

The government's ambitious BharatNet project also seeks to connect every village in the country with fiber broadband access. So far, the government has achieved nearly 70% completion on that.