NEW DELHI: Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) in close cooperation with BSNL, celebrated the completion of 25 years of Indias first C-DOT RAX at Kittur, Karnataka and its up-gradation to MAX-NG for NGN services. This also rejoiced the remarkable Telecom Revolution when Rural India got its first dialer tone. The up-gradation of MAX-NG would be implemented through BSNL network across the country within 2-3 years.
The function was held simultaneously at C-DOT Centers - Delhi, Bangalore and Kittur. Shri Sam Pitroda, Adviser to the Prime Minister on PIII in Delhi with C-DOTs Executive Director Shri V.V.R. Sastry chaired the function in Delhi. Shri Vipin Tyagi, Director C-DOT & Shri P. Raghavan, CGM-BSNL Karnataka chaired the event at Bengaluru. The event at Kittur was chaired by Shri Jayant Bhatnagar, Director C-DOT and Shri B. Krishna Sarma, GMTD BSNL for Begaum/Hubli. Senior officials of Government, BSNL, MTNL and PSUs and Industry Associations also graced the occasion.
Speaking on the occasion, Shri Sam Pitroda, Adviser to the Prime Minister on PIII, said The first phase of the telecom revolution has ended. We have 900 million phones. The second part of the telecom revolution is about to begin. This includes broadband networks connecting 250,000 Panchayats via optical fibre- it is about transforming education, health, governance and the delivery of public services. This phase is going to be much bigger. For any institution, sustaining the initial zeal is hard once the immediate goals are achieved. After C-DOTs goals were achieved, the Indian telecom sector has gone through, and is still going through, a regulatory and technological upheaval. But that has not deterred C-DOTs engineers. It is creditable that through all this turbulence C-DOT has moved on to produce optical fibre transmission equipment, VSAT equipment, upgrading its switches to ISDN, intelligent networking, and even mobile switching technology. The quality of service and price to performance ratio of C-DOT are competitive and attractive in global competition.
Shri V.V.R. Sastry, Executive Director, C-DOT expressed, It is a remarkable moment for all of us at C-DOT, when we celebrate the glorious 25 years since our first center at Kittur was established and brought smiles for the rural parts of our country. The MAX-NG programme will breathe fresh life into the fixed line infrastructure and bring to people of NER, VoIP and Broadband services, giving a fillip to business in Rural India. India will be the only market which is still growing because rural opportunities are there. Voice is the king of revenues, and there are immense prospects on broadband front. All this could be achieved with Quality of service and absolute Reliability. C-DOT in all these years has been on the technology forefront and significantly contributed to the Indian telecom network digitization, bridging the digital divides between the rural and urban, establishing strong telecom manufacturing infrastructure and employment generations. We are all set to build technology excellence meeting current and future needs of telecom markets and other projects of national importance related to telecom.
NGN refers to an all Internet Protocol (IP) network which gives great operational advantages to the operators and subscribers alike. The up-gradation program will bring VoIP and other broadband services to the aging fixed line infrastructure, comprising of its MAX / RAX switches. C-DOT has also developed NGN, GPON which will build broadband pipes to homes, SOHO's and multi-dwelling units. C-DOT in all these years has been on the technology forefront and significantly contributed to the Indian telecom network digitization, bridging the digital divide between the rural and urban, establishing strong telecom manufacturing infrastructure and employment generations. For the next two-to-three years, C-DOT is focusing on design and developing systems which are of strategic importance to the country.
Often, the real import of an event is realised long after its occurrence, when we have the benefit of hindsight. This is what happened in case of RAX, the first product developed by C-DOT, to go into Indias telecom network at the historic city of Kittur, Karnataka, on 21st July 1986. RAX appeared on the scene at a time when countrys telecom network was way under-developed, to say the least. The tele-density languished at one, that is, one telephone for one hundred inhabitants & rural tele-density was zero for all practical purposes.
The greatest advantage of RAX was that it was designed for Indian conditions of high ambient temperatures, dust and unreliable power. It required no air-conditioning. It was based on contemporary digital switching technology with microprocessor based controllers and had no moving parts, which gave it immunity against dust, the bane of electromechanical Strowger and Crossbar exchanges in India. Named 128 P RAX, it was a tiny 128 ports switch. It had only analog trunks to connect it to a larger exchange in a nearby city. It could cater to a total of 80 subscribers and had 24 analog trunks to connect to the city exchange. But in villages with practically no telephones, 80 was a big number. There must be a large number of villagers who made or received their first ever call through C-DOT RAX.
128 P RAX was successful beyond all expectations. It acquired a legendary status in no time at all. It extended connectivity, including STD, ISD to rural areas. 26 manufacturers went into RAX production. RAX-a-day programme was started by DoT which grew to something like 32 RAXes a day. By March 1993, more than 10000 RAXes had been produced. Other developing countries evinced great interest in RAX and exports to Vietnam, Nepal and Bangladesh followed.
Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT)
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