Source: Yojana Magazine
The National Digital Communications Policy, 2018 seeks to unlock the transformative power of digital communications networks – to achieve the goal of digital empowerment and improved well being of the people of India; and towards this end, attempts to outline a set of goals, initiatives, strategies and intended policy outcomes.
The National Communications Policy aims to accomplish the following Strategic Objectives by 2022:
- Provisioning of Broadband for All
- Creating 4 Million additional jobs in the Digital Communications sector
- Enhancing the contribution of the Digital Communications sector to 8% of India’s GDP from ~ 6% in 2017
- Propelling India to the Top 50 Nations in the ICT Development Index of ITU from 134 in 2017
- Enhancing India’s contribution to Global Value Chains
- Ensuring Digital Sovereignty
Vision
To fulfill the information and communication needs of citizens and enterprises through the establishment of a ubiquitous, resilient, secure, accessible and affordable Digital CommunicationsInfrastructure and Services; and in the process, support India’s transition to a digitally empowered economy and society
Missions
In pursuit of accomplishing these objectives by the year 2022, the National Digital Communications Policy, 2018 envisages three Missions:
I) Connect India: Creating Robust Digital Communications Infrastructure
- To promote Broadband for All as a tool for socio-economic development, while ensuring service quality and environmental sustainability.
2022 Goals of Connect India:
- Provide universal broadband connectivity at 50Mbps to every citizen
- Provide 1 Gbps connectivity to all Gram Panchayats of India by 2020 and 10 Gbps by 2022
- Enable100 Mbps broadband on demand to all key development institutions; including all educational institutions
- Enable fixed-line broadband access to 50% of households
- Achieve ‘unique mobile subscriber density’ of 55 by 2020 and 65 by 2022
- Enable deployment of public Wi-Fi Hotspots; to reach 5 million by 2020 and 10 million by 2022
- Ensure connectivity to all uncovered areas
II) Propel India: Enabling Next Generation Technologies and Services through Investments, Innovation and IPR generation
- To harness the power of emerging digital technologies, including 5G, AI, IoT, Cloud, and Big Data to enable the provision of future-ready products and services; and to catalyze the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) by promoting Investments, Innovation, and IPR.
2022 Goals of Propel India:
- Attract investments of USD 100 Billion in the Digital Communications Sector
- Increase India’s contribution to Global Value Chains
- Creation of innovation-led Start-ups in Digital Communications sector
- Creation of Globally recognized IPRs in India
- Development of Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) in the field of digital communication technologies
- Train/ Re-skill 1 Million manpower for building New Age Skills
- Expand the IoT ecosystem to 5 Billion connected devices
- Accelerate the transition to Industry 4.0
III) Secure India: Ensuring Sovereignty, Safety, and Security of Digital Communications
- To secure the interests of citizens and safeguard the digital sovereignty of India with a focus on ensuring individual autonomy and choice, data ownership, privacy, and security; while recognizing data as a crucial economic resource.
2022 Goals of Secure India:
- Establish a comprehensive data protection regime for digital communications that safeguards the privacy, autonomy, and choice of individuals and facilitates India’s effective participation in the global digital economy
- Ensure that net neutrality principles are upheld and aligned with service requirements, bandwidth availability and network capabilities including next-generation access technologies
- Develop and deploy robust digital communication network security frameworks
- Build capacity for security testing and establish appropriate security standards
- Address security issues relating to encryption and security clearances
- Enforce accountability through appropriate institutional mechanisms to assure citizens of safe and secure digital communications infrastructure and services
Impact:
- The NDCP-2018 envisions supporting India’s transition to a digitally empowered economy and society by fulfilling the information and communications needs of citizens and enterprises by the establishment of a ubiquitous, resilient and affordable digital communications infrastructure and services.
- The ‘Customer-focused’ and ‘application-driven’ NDCP-2018 shall lead to new ideas and innovations, after the launch of advanced technology such as 5G, IoT, M2M, etc. which shall govern the telecom sector of India.
