Soon high-speed broadband will be made available in Mumbai through Mumbai Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) as laying of optical fibre cable is underway. Moreover, 174 Wi-Fi hotspots will be installed across Maharashtra, announced Ravi Shankar Prasad, Union minister for communication and information technology on Sunday, but stops short on net neutrality subject.

Prasad said, “MTNL aims to provide high speed broadband to one lakh households in Mumbai. As many as 6,000 surveillance cameras will be installed at 1,800 locations in collaboration with the Mumbai police.”

About the plans of his ministry for Maharashtra, he added that four lakh connections under the next-generation network (NGN) will be made available in the state during the next financial year. This service will be available in Pune, Nagpur, Nashik, Aurangabad, Kolhapur, Kalyan and Nanded in Maharashtra and Goa circle of telecom. NGN is a packet based network which provides voice, data and other media services at high speed.

“As many as 174 Wi-Fi hotspots will be installed in 58 cities across state. A new mobile intelligence network will be set up in Pune, which will facilitate pre-paid mobile service customers,” announced the minister.

On India Post and India Post payment bank, Prasad informed that India Post payment bank would become operational by March 2017 to extend access to formal banking in rural areas. India post is getting attention from across the world. Already 40 national and international consortia have evinced their interest to partner with the postal department for insurance delivery and other financial products.

Speaking on net neutrality, he stopped short on the plans of the government and said, “Telecom Regulatory Authority of India is considering the entire nuances of net neutrality, we have to await their report. Thereafter, the government will take a structured view.” He, however, asserted that Internet, being one of the finest creations of human mind, should not remain the monopoly of few.