Govt wants 50 mbps broadband for all, but no one knows who'll pay for it

Govt hopes the national digital communications policy will generate fresh investments of $100 bn in the digital-telecom space

The national digital communications policy, which comes six years after the previous one (then termed the national telecom policy), is not short on ambition. The department of telecommunications (DoT) has set some stiff targets. It wants to provide universal broadband coverage at a speed of 50 mbps to every citizen in 2022 (over five times the average current data speed at around 9.14 mbps) and fixed broadband access for half the country's households in the next five years.   

At the same time, it is determined to ensure that there are as many as five million public wifi hotspots by