BSNL offers Bharat PC to rural India

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) in collaboration with HCL, Microsoft, Intel and Universal Service Obligation (USO) Fund announced 'Bharat PC' at cash down payment of Rs 2,250 at a monthly installment of Rs 300 for five years. This scheme has been launched under the National Broadband Peneteration Project (NBPP).

Kuldeep Goyal, CMD, BSNL, said: “Availability of terminals to provide broadband service was a challenge in rural India. We have tried to make PC purchase affordable for rural customers. This will help government in meeting its broadband penetration of 20 million by 2010. We were already providing PC with Novartium for our subscribers at price less than Rs 5,000, but it was more urban centric. Bharat PC has been specifically designed for subscribers in rural India.”

A total of RS 1500 crore USOF had been provided to BSNL for increasing broadband penetration. The USOF will be providing Rs 4,500 subsidy per broadband connection that BSNL will be rolling out through its existing 27,789 rural and remote telephone exchange. BSNL will also provide 512 kbps subsidized broadband connection alongwith Bharat PC at Rs 99 with free download up to 400 mb and at Rs 150 with free download upto 1 Gb per month.

A K Jain, general manager, Broadband, BSNL, said: “We are coming out with lowest broadband tariff. For extra download, an user will have to pay 40 paise per mb of download. We will soon install 30,000 broadband kiosks for those who are unable to afford even subsidized Bharat PC.”

HCL has set-up two call centres for assistance for Bharat PC consumers. Bharat PC will come with embedded basic Microsoft software, anti-virus solution, Intel’s atom processor, 512 mb RAM , 80 GB hard disk and 15 inch CRT (cathode ray tube) colour monitor.

This PC could have been offered at much less price than the current total price of Rs 20,250 after subsidy of Rs 4,500 from USOF, on linux OSS platform. Hence, including subsidy from USOF , the total price of Bharat PC is Rs 24,750. Ajay Chowdhry, chairman and CEO, HCL Infosystems justified the price by citing ease of use and five years cost of service to be provided in rural area.

“We could have provided PC on linux platform, but we did not wanted it to be complicated for users in rural area. The other thing is that we will be providing five years of service in rural area which is not an easy task,” said Chowdhry.

Bharart PC will be available through BSNL rural exchanges, franchise partners of BSNL and on HCL stores from October 1, 2009.