3000 Wi-Fi hotspots in Hyderabad on World Wi-Fi day

On World Wi-Fi day , the Telangana government rolled out the `Hyderabad City Hy-Fi Project' to digitally connect the citizens of the city.The project is touted to be one of the largest public Wi-Fi initiatives in the country where 1,000 Wi-Fi hotspots have been set up by telecom and broadband players such as Airtel, ACT Fibernet and Indus Towers across the city .The project is expected to cover 3000 hotspots in the city over the next three months.

These hotspots will offer an bandwidth of 5-10 Mbps with 30 minutes of free Wi-Fi. After 30 minutes, users will have to pay for the services. The browsing charges are being discussed with industry so as to ensure that standard charges are levied by all the players.

In June 2015, under the `Digital Telangana' programme, a pilot version of this project was launched, where the state government partnered with ISPs (internet service providers) to provide free Wi-Fi for 30 minutes at around 100 public spots such as malls, tourist spots, public offices, police stations, government schools and colleges, among others. Over the last two years, the



government has been able to scale up this number to over 250 locations.

Launching the project, ITE&C department principal secretary Jayesh Ranjan said, “Digital India is the future and Telangana is marching ahead to achieve this dream. Hy-Fi is another pro-people initiative where citizens will be able to avail free Wi-Fi. Businessperson, shopkeepers, entrepreneurs, students, women and tourists will benefit from this essential service.“ 

The industry has invested Rs 300 crore for the rollout of this project, he added. Rajan S Mathews, director general of apex telecom industry association, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), which is the technical advisor to the state government for this project, said, “As part of this ambitious project, the telecom industry will partner in the timely completion of the HiFi project. With successful completion , Hyderabad and Telangana will set an example for the rest of the country . This will provide high speed internet access connecting citizens with education and commerce.“