2m poor families to get free Internet services in Indian state of Kerala

AM Abdussalam, Correspondent

Kerala, the first state in India to make Internet a basic right for its residents, is all geared to launch the ambitious Kerala Fibre Optic Network (K-FON) project on  June 5, according to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.

Apart from providing high-speed Internet facility and phone connections to government offices including schools, the project will also provide free Internet to two million economically backward families in the state.

“The project will provide free Internet to the poor and connectivity at affordable rates to others. The service will be an alternative to corporate powers in the telecom sector.

“At present, 18,000 government offices are equipped with K-FON. The K-FON project is envisaged as a service to overcome the ‘digital divide’ in society,” Vijayan said in Facebook post.

According to the chief minister, the infrastructure facilities to provide Internet to 7,000 houses have already been readied.

“The connections have been given to 748 houses. At present, around 18000 government institutions have been provided Internet facility through K-FON.

“Infrastructure to provide connection to 7,000 households has been completed,” he said.

Vijayan said that K-FON will become a project that lays the foundation for the efforts to build a new Kerala with emphasis on the knowledge economy.

The chief minister said that the project will help in making the digital infrastructure of the state strong and efficient and making e-governance universal.

K-FON will provide free, low-cost and quality high-speed Internet to all, and is also the Left Democratic Front (LDF) government’s alternative to the corporate forces dominating the telecom sector.

Union telecom department had already issued a category 1 license (IP1 License) to provide infrastructure services and an Internet Service Provider (ISP) category B unified license to officially provide Internet services.

IP1 Licence is the authorisation to provide Internet bandwidth to tech-enabled service providers like OSPs (other service providers) and telecom companies.