Kathmandu, April 5:

The third time appointed managing director Sugat Ratna Kansakar has very aggressive and ambitious plan for the Nepal Telecomm’s (NT) expansion.

“Within two years, we will increase the teledensity of NT to 26 per cent from the present eight per cent,” Kansakar said, adding that the total teledensity in Nepal including the private players is, however, at around 12 per cent now.

“There is still enough room — upto 25 to 30 per cent — for expansion,” the MD of state-owned telecom giant added. Apart from NT’s ambitious plan ‘Mission 2010 for increasing its customer base from the current two million to seven million in the next three years, Kansakar highlighted that he has been successful in boosting the confidence of staff despite the robust private players’ entry in the domestic market.

NT plans to connect all 75 districts by wireless telephones based on Code Division Multiplexing Access (CDMA) technology and Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM) cellular mobile phones. “As of today, NT has already connected 74 out of 75 district headquarters with CDMA and 70 districts with GSM cellular mobile phones,” Kansakar informed.

NT has already started installation of additional 3.5 million mobiles phones and will increase CDMA lines to two million. It is also planning the expansion of PSTN lines.

However, consumers complain of poor quality of NT cellular mobile phones. He agrees but according to him, quality upgradation and expansion plan go hand in hand. “Before eight years, NT had only 18 towers but now, there are 300 towers throughout the country,” he said adding that NT is trying to stall more towers to maintain quality with increasing number of consumers.

“In next two years, NT will install 18,00 BTS and 400 CDMA towers throughout the country,” he added. “Assessing the huge demand of CDMA phones and pre-paid mobile phones, we foresee the need for such a huge expansion plan,” Kansakar added.

The additional CDMA lines will be mostly distributed in hilly regions to better serve the rural populace. “According to the Three-Year Interim Plan, NT will provide Internet service to the remotest of the villages,” he promised.

While the government’s long-term plan for telecom and information technology unveiled in 2002 claimed there would be 15 telephone connections per 100 people by 2014, NT’s Mission 2010 has plans for having 20 lines per 100 people within the next three years.

Kansakar further said that NT would soon come up with a plan to provide on-demand connections for GSM pre-paid mobile phones and CDMA Sky phones. “We plan to start on-demand supply of new connections for Kathmandu valley within next two months,” he informed.