DHAKA, March 15, 2021 (BSS) – The government has initiated a big move to establish broadband internet connectivity all divisions across the country to reach the government services easily and speedily to the people.
The Department of Information and Communication Technology under the ICT Division has already framed a draft project to this end titled “Establishing Digital Connectivity” involving an overall estimated cost of Taka 5,883.74 crore.
Of the total project cost, Taka 2,505.16 crore will come from the government of Bangladesh while the rest of Taka 3,378.57 crore as project assistance from China, said a senior Planning Commission official.
The official told BSS that the project is likely to be placed before the meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) billed for tomorrow.
ECNEC Chairperson and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will preside over the meeting virtually from her official Ganobhaban residence.
The official said the main objectives of the project are to reach the government services speedily and with ease and comfort after transforming those into e-service and thus establishing necessary ICT infrastructures to increase the use of ICT in the country.
Talking to the national news agency, State Minister for ICT Junaid Ahmed Palak said the main objective of this project is to stretch the fiber optic connectivity to the village-level from the union-level.
“The way the present government has reached electricity to the village-level, fiber optic connectivity will also be reached up in the same way to the village-level,” he added.
The State Minister said under the project, some 1,09,244 broadband and user connectivity would be established, some 10,000 Sheikh Russell digital labs would be set up, central server infrastructures would be installed for accommodating some 555 DSET field-level cloud file services and digital storage.
Besides, he informed that some 10 digital village stations would be set up as well as a 21-storey “DoICT Tower” will be constructed in the city’s Purbachal area alongside constructing 492 non-residential buildings.
Palak said under the project, a good number of entrepreneurs would be created in the ICT sector.
He said CRVS central ISDP server will be set up under the project to implement Civil Registration and Vital Statistics operations.
Planning Commission officials said the project operations also include establishing 57 specialised labs, central cloud platform, and frontier technology center of excellence, expanding LAN, NOC facilities with IT infrastructures at district and upazila complexes.
Besides, there will be a digital literacy center having all necessary ICT infrastructure facilities like ICT lab, smart virtual classrooms, distance learning platform.
The Planning Commission has also recommended for giving approval to the project by the ECNEC.