RailTel Corporation and CSC e-Governance Services India have signed MoU to leverage each other’s strength for increasing broadband penetration in rural and semi-urban areas for bridging the digital divide.
The company has already set up about 200 ‘RailWire Saathi’ kiosks at rural/semi urban railway stations which will now be operated by the VLEs of CSC. This will enable citizens by providing various digital services and also create awareness about RailWire services in rural areas. RailTel also has 6,070 PoPs (point of presence) on its network, out of which 5,000 are in rural areas. Utilising these rural PoPs RailTel, in partnership with CSC, will deliver broadband services to rural areas.
e-Governance Services India is enabling rural population with a host of e-governance services for digital inclusion. The CSC e-Governance Services India is a special purpose vehicle under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology. The key stakeholder of the CSC scheme is the village level entrepreneur (VLE).
RailTel Corporation a ‘Mini Ratna (Category-I)’ PSU is one of the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in the country owning a Pan-India optic fiber network on exclusive Right of Way (ROW) along Railway track. The company provides broadband telecom and multimedia network across the country.