Some good news finally.
TRAI won the case in Supreme Court- though after being scuttled by VSNL repeatedly over the bandwidth issue. This had resulted in huge cost for the end consumers- namely BPO’s and the IT industry guys.
In the grand staging, I believe that it must have taken considerable lobbying efforts to maintain “India’s pre eminence”. Even though I don’t support the BPO industry- for simple reason that the nature of the business is cyclical, yet it is providing employment. Better than having useless undergraduates or whipped up testosterone rampaging on the streets. Though what worries me is the imminent “layoffs”- if not now then in the future. It’s a party that’s going to end; a bubble that’s going to burst.
It should indeed be taken with a pinch of salt. Like a single swallow doesnt make a summer, the huge number of IT parks don’t make India a “powerhouse to reckon with”- despite the assertions of NASSCOM or their ilk.
However, the whole thrust here is on the end consumer- you and me. Would the ISP’s reduce the access rates? Would the likes of BSNL affect unlimited downloads or higher access speeds? The answer is too premature. I believe, in all probability, the answer would be cleared by March end. That’s the time when BSNL is rumoured to launch it’s IPTV. Finally, there was some talk of equipment suppliers screwing up (the biggies like IBM) who haven’t supplied the servers as yet. So we might have to suffer BSNL for some more time.
The bulk of the traffic is concenterated with VSNL and Reliance at present. Bharti is another player with it’s own cable. BSNL, too has announced it’s plans to jump in the fray.
What I can smell here is oilgopolies and cartelisation. Simple rule of Economics. In all probabilty, if you are tracking the telecom industry through media, be prepared to read phrases like “intense competion” et al. There is no “competition” and bandwidth access would be throttled. At best, a biggie player may eat up a smaller one. Popularly called as “merger and acquistion”.
Figure of speech.