With the government aiming to use technology to reach out to its citizen, the government plans on starting the rural mobile phone project to help connect with the rural people.
According to reports, the Indian government is soon going to roll out the Bharat Mobile Scheme, which offers free mobile phone with Internet connection to rural and poor people. The project is estimated to cost Rs. 7000 crores to cover around 2.5 crore households in rural India. The government would charge a one-time fee of Rs 300 per handset. The user would get 30 minutes of talk time, 30 SMS and 30MB of data usage per month free for two years.
Currently BSNL has been appointed to provide the services for Rs. 5000 crore for three years of free services. The amount would come from the Universal Service Obligation Fund, which is collected from telecom companies to improve connectivity in rural areas. However each household would be entitled to just one handset. Also it is proposed that the woman in every household will be the most eligible candidate to get the Internet-enabled phone.
