Mayor B. Rammohan on Tuesday launched the ‘Hyderabad City Wi-Fi Project’ or ‘Hy-Fi’ with over 1,000 hotspots where citizens can access Internet for about half an hour free. Gradually, these hotspots, in association with the cellular phone and Internet operators, are to be upgraded to 3,000 across different areas of the twin cities.
Claiming that such a huge free Wi-Fi hotspots being launched is first for any city in the country, the Mayor said the net bandwidth speeds will be from 5 Mbps to 10 Mpbs and charges will be nominal after the first half hour. He assured that the city, which has already attained fame for its IT and business-friendly initiatives, will continue to adopt new technologies for the citizens’ benefit, especially in making it digitally well connected.
“Digital India is the future and Telangana is marching ahead to achieve this dream. ‘Hy-Fi’ is another people’s initiative which will benefit everyone from businessperson, shopkeepers, entrepreneurs, students, women and tourists,” said Jayesh Ranjan, IT & Industries Secretary.
Initially, the Government had set up 100 Wi-Fi hotspots at malls, tourist places, public offices, police stations, Government schools, colleges, etc. This number was increased to 250 locations with the help of the telecom industry. GHMC Commissioner B. Janardhan Reddy felt that the ‘Hy-Fi’ project was another major achievement for the city.
To provide the last mile home connectivity, Bangalore-based ACT Fibernet has been chosen and its CEO Bala Malladi said the partnership with the TS Government will help provide high speed Internet access to homes and also while being on the move as the Wi-Fi hotspots keep increasing.
Director-General of Cellular Operations Association of India Rajan S. Mathews and Bharti Airtel Circle CEO Venkatesh Vijayraghavan hailed the partnership project, vowed to complete the work on the country’s fastest and largest Wi-Fi network on time so as to connect the citizens with education, commerce and other opportunities.
