Meghalaya CM Conrad K Sangma launches fibre to home broadband for Tura town

Shillong (Meghalaya) [India], December 17 : Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma on Tuesday launched the "Fibre to Home Broadband for Tura town" under the last mile connectivity project (LMC) virtually from Shillong.
As per officials, the commissioning of the LMC at the Deputy Commissioner's Office will ensure that the citizens of Tura Town avail the benefit of reliable Fibre To The Home (FTTH) broadband through a local Internet Service Provider (ISP) will procure broadband in bulk from PowerTel.
During the project launch, the Chief Minister stated that the government is committed to delivering all services to citizens in an accessible, transparent, reliable, and cost-effective manner.
He said that the government is putting adequate thrust towards increasing internet penetration both for the citizens in the State and for the remotest Government offices in Meghalaya.
The LMC project uses the available optical ground wire (OPGW) infrastructure and is powered by the International Internet Gateway (IIG) project. The IIG will aid the Tech Park initiatives in the state by bringing low latency, low cost, high speed, and secured bandwidth to the organizations operating in the Tech Parks.
Informing on the challenges of underground optical fibre cables (OFCs), the Chief Minister said, "The state government is leveraging the optical ground wire (OPGW) of the Meghalaya Power Transmission Corporation Ltd. (MePTCL) in partnership with Power Grid Teleservices Ltd, to overcome the challenge and provide high-speed internet services."
In OPGW, the optical fibre is placed on the ground wire of the overhead high-voltage transmission line to form a fibre-optic communication network on the transmission line.
MePTCL (Meghalaya Power Transmission Corporation Limited) has about 665 Km of OPGW laid on its transmission lines and 225 km of lines are under deployment. One pair of OPGW was leased by PowerTel from MePTCL exclusively for the Last Mile Connectivity project.
The Chief Minister announced plans to establish a robust backbone for Last Mile Connectivity (LMC) using Optical Power Ground Wire (OPGW) technology.
This will enable the extension of Optical Fibre Connectivity (OFC) to every Block Head-quarter, Sub-Divisional Head-Quarters, District Head-Quarters, and other offices, ultimately providing connectivity to grassroots users across the state.
"OPGW will form the robust backbone on which Last Mile Connectivity (LMC) will be provided to the grassroots users in the State. The government intends to extend OFC connectivity from the OPGW backbone to every Block Head-quarter (BHQ), Sub-Divisional Head-Quarters (SDHQ) District Head-Quarters (DHQ), and other offices," he said.
"Fibre to the Home (FTTH) connectivity to households, will be extended from the different government office HQs and MePTCL stations in collaboration with local ISPs and entrepreneurs," the Chief Minister added.
In Phase I of the LMC project, 30 Administrative HQs will be connected, these include 9 DHQs, 1 SDHQ, and 20 BHQs.