250 mn phone connections by 2007: Maran

Telecom connections in the country were expected to reach 250 million by next year, Union Communication and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran said today.

This included mobile, landline and broadband connections, he told reporters on the sidelines of a function organised to inaugurate Telecordia, India's state-of-the-art laboratory here.

The Centre had fixed a target of 500 million connections by 2010. Maran said Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi had recently promised that the state would soon set up an IT taskforce, with captains of IT industry as members, to discuss the industry's problems.

He said the people were keenly watching the success of "internet protocol television", which would be implemented in India soon.