Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia: Commitment to Connect ‘Vibrant Villages’ of the Northeast and Remote Areas

Ministry of Communications Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia: Commitment to Connect ‘Vibrant Villages’ of the Northeast and Remote Areas “Entire Country to Be Covered with 4G in the Next Few Months”: Dr Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani Over 6.31 Lakh Villages Covered with 4G; 5G Reaches Around 5 Lakh Villages India Nears Universal 4G Coverage Across Villages; Rapid 5G Expansion Underway BSNL Deploys 1 Lakh Indigenous Towers; 4G Saturation in Final Phase Posted On: 11 FEB 2026 6:13PM by PIB Delhi Union Minister of Communications and Development of North Eastern Region, Shri Jyotiraditya Scindia while responding to questions in the Lok Sabha today, highlighted the government’s commitment to extend connectivity to all parts of the country, including the remotest areas. Empowering the First Villages of the Ashtalakshmi States Addressing connectivity challenges in the Northeast, Union Minister Shri Scindia specifically mentioned remote regions such as Vijaynagar in Arunachal Pradesh. He said that Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has transformed the mindset from viewing the “last villages” to recognizing them as “India’s first villages” under the Vibrant Village Programme. The government remains fully committed to digitally empowering these regions. He also spoke about working in coordination with the Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh and the Member concerned of Parliament to address environmental and geographical challenges, including those related to wildlife sanctuary and Right of Way (RoW) issues. Dr Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani, Minister of State for Rural Development and Communications, while replying to a supplementary question, said that India has achieved near-universal 4G coverage across its villages and is witnessing one of the fastest 5G rollouts globally. He informed that out of nearly 6,40,000 villages in the country, about 6,31,000 villages have been covered with 4G services by both private operators and BSNL. The remaining 10,000 villages are being covered under ongoing 4G saturation projects and are expected to be connected in the coming months.Dr Pemmasani further stated that BSNL has deployed 1,00,000 towers using indigenous technology, particularly in areas where private players find limited techno-commercial viability. The Minister also noted that approximately 5,00,000 villages have already been covered with 5G services, marking one of the fastest 5G rollouts in the world. Following details were also given in a written reply: During the last three financial years (from 1.4.2022 to 31.3.2025), 8,50,284 route kilometres of optical fibre cable (OFC) were laid. State-wise details are as under: S. State / Union territory OFC laid during the last three Total OFC laid (as of financial years (from 31.12.2025), in route no. kilometers 1.4.2022 to 31.3.2025), in route kilometers 1 Andaman and Nicobar 390 1,544 Islands 2 Andhra Pradesh 81,307 2,51,753 3 Arunachal Pradesh 2,627 9,913 4 Assam 27,523 93,234 5 Bihar 17,210 1,29,992 6 Chandigarh 2,073 24,763 7 Chhattisgarh 18,399 1,18,7938 Dadra and Nagar Haveli and 217 1,328 Daman and Diu 9 Delhi 10,830 77,409 10 Goa 648 5,065 11 Gujarat 24,235 2,90,429 12 Haryana 8,253 83,932 13 Himachal Pradesh 5,802 35,787 14 Jammu and Kashmir 10,809 44,479 15 Jharkhand 16,720 82,034 16 Karnataka 27,629 2,26,763 17 Kerala 88,591 2,59,252 18 Ladakh 1,209 5,663 19 Lakshadweep 20 59 20 Madhya Pradesh 30,374 2,63,453 21 Maharashtra 70,178 4,06,637 22 Manipur 2,500 10,499 23 Meghalaya 3,580 11,952 24 Mizoram 1,718 8,332 25 Nagaland 2,277 10,057 26 Odisha 26,406 1,56,298 27 Puducherry 137 138 28 Punjab 60,654 1,97,105 29 Rajasthan 45,058 2,39,45830 Sikkim 474 4,827 31 Tamil Nadu 1,02,865 3,08,907 32 Telangana 65,691 2,37,946 33 Tripura 1,460 11,294 34 Uttar Pradesh 55,672 4,06,697 35 Uttarakhand 9,428 50,178 36 West Bengal 27,320 1,87,364 Total 8,50,284 42,53,334 Details of measurable improvements across the country are as follows: i. Mobile broadband speed: Average mobile broadband download speed has increased from 13.67 Mbps in March 2022 to 132.00 Mbps in December 2025 as per Ookla’s global speedtest index. ii. Network reliability: As per the report of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) for December 2025, all Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) met all Quality of Service (QoS) benchmarks for network-related parameters for the 4G/5G network. iii. 4G/5G readiness: The number of the 4G/5G Base Transceiver Stations (BTSs) increased by 51.33% from 16.91 lakh as on 31.3.2022 to 25.59 lakh as on 31.12.2025. State-wise details are at Annexure-II. iv. Latency: As per TRAI report, latency in September 2025 is less than 75 milliseconds and the cumulative downtime (cells not available for service) is within the specified limits of less than 2%. The above information is for the whole country, including Karnataka and Bengaluru. District-wise details of OFC connected and service-ready Gram Panchayats under BharatNet, in rural areas and border-touching areas, including Bulandshahr district and the Bhiwani Mahendergarh Lok Sabha constituency, are available at the Department of Telecommunications website (https://www.dot.gov.in/static/uploads/2026/02/1f908efb879806628e9f32bf4b966c30.pdf). In Palghar district in Maharashtra, 4,830 route kilometres of OFC have been laid. Broadband speed and network reliability may be temporarily impacted due to OFC cuts during road widening work, pipeline work and public utility works carried out by local municipal authorities. The expansion of OFC connectivity in rural areas has significantly facilitated adoption of digital services across the country. The availability of high-speed broadband has strengthened service delivery and accessibility, allowing citizens in rural and remote areas to access Government services through Common Service Centres (CSCs), online portals and digital platforms. The status of some of the key e-governance initiatives is as follows:i. Aadhaar is the world’s largest digital identity system that provides biometric and demographic data based unique digital identity. Over 143 crore Aadhaar numbers have been generated so far. ii. DigiLocker has enabled access on anytime, anywhere basis to authenticate digital documents from the original issuer for the common citizen. More than 65.01 crore users are registered with DigiLocker to avail of its services. iii. The Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance (UMANG) mobile application for all government services is operational and offers over 2,390 services for individuals. It has witnessed cumulative 726.43 crore transactions. iv. CSCs are offering government and business services in the assisted digital mode. Over 800 services are being delivered through CSCs. As of December 2025, 5.87 lakh CSCs were functional across the country, in both rural and urban areas, of which 4.57 lakh were functional at the Gram Panchayat level in rural areas. v. Pradhan Mantri Gramin Digital Saksharta Abhiyan (PMGDISHA), which was initiated to reach functional digital literacy in 6 crore rural households (one person per household) nationwide, has reached 6.39 crore individuals. vi. During the financial year 2024-25, total digital payments transactions were 23,834 crore. The number of such transactions in the current financial year, till 4.2.2026, is 20,856 crore. Due to expanded OFC connectivity under BharatNet Project, a total of 2,14,904 Gram Panchayats have been made service-ready, as of 31.12.2025. Further, out of 6,44,131 villages in the country (village data as per the office of the Registrar General of India), around 6,34,955 villages are covered with mobile connectivity, including 6,31,834 villages having 4G mobile connectivity. Thus, 98.09% villages have access to internet. As of 30.9.2025, out of a total of 101.78 crore internet subscribers in India, 42.77 crore are rural subscribers and 59.01 crore are urban subscribers. Annexure-II S. State/ Union territory 4G/5G Base 4G/5G Base no. Transceiver Stations Transceiver Stations (BTSs), as (BTSs), as on on 31.12.2025 31.3.2022 1 Andaman & Nicobar 399 987 2 Andhra Pradesh 58,722 91,588 3 Arunachal Pradesh 2,595 5,060 4 Assam 38,622 56,327 5 Bihar 78,755 1,26,048 6 Chandigarh 2,512 3,6247 Chhattisgarh 32,489 49,481 8 Delhi 49,116 68,077 9 Goa 3,903 5,929 10 Gujarat 1,04,209 1,57,413 11 Haryana 54,071 83,571 12 Himachal Pradesh 17,902 27,087 13 Jammu & Kashmir 25,113 37,180 14 Jharkhand 36,532 54,584 15 Karnataka 1,09,796 1,56,930 16 Kerala 60,955 98,413 17 Ladakh 732 1,625 18 Lakshadweep 14 64 19 Madhya Pradesh 86,955 1,30,782 20 Maharashtra 1,78,661 2,69,542 21 Manipur 5,104 7,281 22 Meghalaya 5,020 6,903 23 Mizoram 2,435 3,436 24 Nagaland 3,596 5,205 25 Odisha 52,082 83,767 26 Puducherry 1,704 2,938 27 Punjab 55,366 83,308 28 Rajasthan 91,620 1,42,64429 Sikkim 1,712 2,187 30 Tamil Nadu 1,11,698 1,72,584 31 Telangana 64,864 94,612 32 Tripura 5,577 8,052 33 Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman 1,219 1,906 and Diu 34 Uttar Pradesh 2,13,702 3,21,123 35 Uttarakhand 21,981 32,500 36 West Bengal 1,11,571 1,66,946 Grand Total 16,91,304 25,59,704 आदरणीय प्रधानमंी ी @narendramodi जी के नेतृत्व म @DoT_India और @MDoNER_India दोन मलकर हमार अष्टली रा के हर गांव तक तेज इंटरनेट सेवा पचं ान े के लए प्रतबद्ध ह। pic. twitter.com/MWv7bW0wx8 — Jyotiraditya M. Scindia (@JM_Scindia) February 11, 2026 (LS-STARRED QUESTION NO. 169; 11-02-2026) Follow DoT Handles for more: - X - https://x.com/DoT_India Insta- https://www.instagram.com/department_of_telecom?igsh=MXUxbHFjd3llZTU0YQ== Fb - https://www.facebook.com/DoTIndia Youtube: https://youtube.com/@departmentoftelecom?si=DALnhYkt89U5jAaa ***** MI/ARJ (Release ID: 2226569) Visitor Counter : 163 Read this release in: Urdu , ही , Telugu