Communications infrastructure

Detail

1. What communication infrastructure is

• Communication infrastructure means the physical and digital parts that carry messages, images and videos from one place to another:
• cables, including optical fibre;
• wireless devices and towers;
• satellites;

• data centres, which are large buildings full of servers that store and process data.

• It is physical infrastructure in the same way that roads and power lines are. It is also a base for services such as education, trade, payments and governance.

2. The invisible chain: Rani's voice note (Class 7)

• Rani sends a voice note from a village in Madhya Pradesh to her cousin in Tamil Nadu. The message passes through five links: 1. Electricity powers the village mobile tower. With no power there is no signal, so communication depends on energy infrastructure. 2. Fibre-optic cables under fields and roads carry the signal as pulses of light. 3. Satellites relay the signal where cables do not reach. 4. Servers in distant cities process and route the message. 5. The message arrives on her cousin's phone.

• The lesson is that one simple message needs energy, transport corridors (for laying cable), space assets and data centres all working together.

3. Uses: why the network matters

• Education: online classes, digital libraries and educational videos reach students in remote areas.
• Disaster management: SMS alerts and apps warn people before cyclones, floods and similar events.
• E-commerce (buying and selling goods and services on online platforms) lets both small and large sellers reach buyers across the country.
• Online payments: money moves instantly. UPI is covered in the payment-systems-digital-finance note.
• E-governance means the government delivers services through communication technology, such as applying for documents, filing complaints and getting information.

• Example: DigiLocker is a digital locker that stores documents like the Aadhaar card and driving licence.

• Overall result: more ease of living, because people spend less time, money and travel to get a service.

4. The price revolution and scale

• 1990s: mobile calls cost up to ₹17 a minute, and incoming calls were also charged.
• Today: India's tariffs are among the cheapest in the world.

• The average tariff for 1 GB of wireless data fell from ₹10.91 (September 2018) to ₹8.31 (June 2024) [7].

• Teledensity is the number of telephone connections for every 100 people.

• Example: 80 connections for every 100 people means a teledensity of 80%.

• India's wireless (mobile) teledensity was 82.57% (October 2025) [2].

• Subscriber numbers. The latest official figures are:

• Wireless (mobile) subscribers: 1,171.87 million (October 2025). Of these, 1,094.28 million were active [2]. (NCERT: 1,160 million wireless subscribers, 2025.)
• Wireless including Fixed Wireless Access (FWA): 1,184.62 million (October 2025). FWA is home internet delivered by radio signal instead of cable [2].
• Broadband subscribers: 999.81 million (October 2025) [2].

• Internet subscribers: grew from 1,028.61 million (December 2025) to 1,092.79 million (March 2026), a quarterly growth of 6.24% [3]. (NCERT: nearly 900 million internet connections, 2025.)

• NCERT Fig. 7.23 gives the timeline of this growth.

5. J.C. Bose: an Indian pioneer of wireless (1858–1937)

• 1895, Calcutta: Bose showed that millimetre-wave signals (very short radio waves) could pass through a wall. He used them to ring a bell and fire a remote-control gun.
• His inventions:
• an improved coherer, the part of a receiver that detects and decodes the radio signal;
• a galena crystal detector, one of the earliest semiconductor devices (a semiconductor is a material that conducts electricity only partly, and it is the base of modern chips);

• antennas and waveguides (tubes that guide radio waves).

• Patents:

• Bose rarely patented his work.
• Marconi patented a similar device in 1901 and sent a radio signal across the Atlantic in the same year.

• Marconi won the Nobel Prize in 1909.

• Bose founded the Bose Institute in 1917.

• A patent is a right, granted for a set number of years, to be the only one who can make, sell or use an invention.
• Lesson: patents secure recognition and economic value for inventors. This links to intellectual property rights (IPR, legal ownership of ideas and inventions).

6. Constitutional and institutional frame

• Seventh Schedule, Union List, Entry 31: posts and telegraphs, telephones, wireless, broadcasting and similar forms of communication.

• So only Parliament makes laws on telecom.

• TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India), set up in 1997:

• fixes and reviews tariffs;
• recommends spectrum pricing;
• protects consumers;

• publishes monthly subscriber data.

• Changes under the Telecommunications Act 2023: TRAI Chairperson and members can now include people with 30 and 25 years of professional experience respectively [4].

• Disputes: appeals go to TDSAT, the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal [4].

7. Policy path: from state monopoly to competition

• National Telecom Policy (NTP) 1994: opened basic telephone services to private players.
• NTP 1999: moved from fixed licence fees to revenue sharing.
• Under fixed fees, operators had bid very high fixed amounts and could not pay.
• Under revenue sharing, they pay a share of what they actually earn.

• This saved the industry.

• National Digital Communications Policy (NDCP) 2018: shifted the focus from voice calls to broadband, digital services and investment.

8. AGR: the revenue base for government dues

• Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) is the revenue on which telecom operators pay:
• the licence fee; and

• spectrum usage charges (SUC), a yearly charge for using airwaves.

• Formula: Licence fee = 8% × AGR. This 8% includes a 5% USO levy.

• Worked example: an operator's AGR is ₹10,000 crore.
• Licence fee = 8% × 10,000 = ₹800 crore.
• Of this, USO levy = 5% × 10,000 = ₹500 crore, and the other ₹300 crore is the rest of the licence fee.

• SUC is paid separately, as a percentage of AGR that depends on the spectrum held.

• Supreme Court ruling, October 2019:

• It put non-telecom revenue (for example rent and interest income) inside AGR.
• This created old dues of about ₹1.5 lakh crore.

• Several operators came under severe financial stress.

• Telecom relief package, September 2021:

• redefined AGR from now on (prospectively) to exclude non-telecom revenue;
• gave a 4-year moratorium, meaning a pause on payment of dues;
• allowed 100% FDI through the automatic route, so foreign investors no longer need prior government approval.

9. Universal Service Obligation and Digital Bharat Nidhi

• Universal Service Obligation (USO) is the duty to make basic telecom available to everyone, including people in remote and loss-making areas.

• It is funded by the 5% levy on operators.

• Telecommunications Act 2023:

• renamed the Universal Service Obligation Fund as Digital Bharat Nidhi (DBN);

• widened DBN's use to include telecom research and development [4][5].

• DBN Rules 2024 target:

• mobile and broadband in underserved rural, remote and urban areas;
• targeted access for women, persons with disabilities, and economically and socially weaker sections [5].

10. The Telecommunications Act 2023

• Passed by the Lok Sabha on 20 December 2023 and the Rajya Sabha on 21 December 2023 [4].
• Repealed the Indian Telegraph Act 1885 and the Indian Wireless Telegraphy Act 1933 [4].
• Authorisation: the old licensing system is replaced. Anyone who runs a network or provides a service needs Central Government authorisation [4].
• Spectrum is assigned in two ways [4]:
• Auction is the default for commercial use.

• Administrative assignment (allotment without auction) is used for national security and defence, disaster management, weather forecasting, transport, satellite services (DTH, satellite telephony), BSNL, MTNL and public broadcasting.

• Right of way is the legal right to lay cables and towers on land. Operators get it on public and private property, on a non-discriminatory and non-exclusive basis. The Telecommunications (Right of Way) Rules 2024 were issued under the Act [4][5].

• Interception and suspension: the government may intercept or block messages, or suspend services, on grounds such as security of the State and public order [4].
• Penalties [4]:
• providing a service without authorisation: up to 3 years in jail and/or a ₹2 crore fine;
• breaking the terms of an authorisation: a civil penalty of up to ₹5 crore.

11. Rollout: fibre, 5G and satellites

• BharatNet lays optical fibre to every gram panchayat (GP).
• 6,94,711 km of optical fibre cable had been laid by October 2025 [6].
• 2,14,904 GPs were service-ready, meaning broadband was available, as of 31 December 2025 [8].

• 5,034 GPs are connected by satellite where fibre is not practical [6].

• 5G launched in October 2022.

• It reached 99.9% of districts, with over 5.18 lakh 5G base transceiver stations (BTS) (December 2025). A BTS is the radio equipment on a mobile tower [9].

• 4G and 5G BTS together rose 51.33%, from 16.91 lakh (31 March 2022) to 25.59 lakh (31 December 2025) [8].

• Satellite broadband:

• The Department of Telecommunications gives GMPCS authorisations (Global Mobile Personal Communication by Satellite) under the Unified Licence.
• Starlink got its Unified Licence on 6 June 2025 for GMPCS, commercial VSAT and ISP-'A' services [10].

12. Colonial contrast (Class 11)

• The telegraph was built to maintain law and order for British rule, not to serve citizens.
• Postal services remained inadequate.
• Railways came in 1853, but the network served colonial trade and administration.
• Today: the network is built for citizens, through universal service, cheap tariffs and e-governance.

13. Overlaps

• Digital public infrastructure (UPI, Aadhaar stack) → payment-systems-digital-finance.
• Digital divide (the gap between people who have digital access and people who do not) → sectors-of-economy.

Prelims Hooks

• Posts, telegraphs, telephones, wireless and broadcasting are in Union List Entry 31, not the Concurrent List.
• TRAI was set up in 1997. NTP 1999 brought the revenue-sharing regime. NTP 1994 opened basic services to private players.
• Licence fee = 8% of AGR, which includes a 5% USO levy. The SC's October 2019 AGR ruling included non-telecom revenue in AGR.
• The September 2021 package allowed 100% FDI via the automatic route in telecom.
• The Telecommunications Act 2023 repealed the Telegraph Act 1885 and the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1933. It renamed USOF as Digital Bharat Nidhi, which can also fund R&D [4].
• Trap: under the 2023 Act, satellite services such as DTH and satellite telephony get spectrum by administrative assignment, not auction [4].
• J.C. Bose made the galena crystal detector, an early semiconductor. Marconi got a patent in 1901 and the Nobel Prize in 1909. The Bose Institute was founded in 1917.
• Mobile teledensity was about 82.6% (October 2025). Broadband subscribers were almost 1,000 million (October 2025) [2].
• 5G launched in October 2022 and covers 99.9% of districts (December 2025) [9].

Mains Points

• Getting regulation right decides whether the sector survives:
• Fixed fees (1994) led to defaults. Revenue sharing (1999) brought a boom.
• The broad AGR definition (2019) caused severe financial stress and reduced competition.
• The 2021 reforms restored confidence.

• Lesson: prices and levies must match what operators actually earn. Otherwise the government's revenue grab ends up hurting consumers.

• Universal access versus viability:

• Private operators avoid remote, loss-making areas.
• The 5% USO levy / Digital Bharat Nidhi and BharatNet fill this gap.

• But turning 2.1 lakh service-ready GPs into actual household connections needs last-mile investment, reliable power and digital literacy [8].

• The 2023 Act: balancing speed and rights:

• Faster right of way and simple authorisation help rollout.
• Wide powers of interception and suspension raise concerns about privacy and free speech (Articles 19 and 21).

• These concerns need procedural safeguards, as the PRS legislative analysis points out [4].

• From colonial control to citizen service:

• The colonial telegraph served law and order.
• Today's cheap, universal network powers e-governance, e-commerce and disaster alerts.
• It is infrastructure for ease of living and inclusive growth. The J.C. Bose story adds a case for stronger IPR and domestic R&D.