Question : WAITING LIST IN RAJASTHAN

(a) whether urban and rural areas of all the districts of Rajasthan have been provided with telephone facilities;

(b) if not, the number of villages where telephone facility has not been provided, district-wise;

(c) the details of the waiting list in rural areas of Rajasthan, district-wise;

(d) the reasons behind the failure of Government in achieving the targets of National Telecom Policy in rural areas;

(e) the time by which the waiting list of telephone connection in rural areas of Rajasthan is likely to be cleared;

(f) the provision of funds provided for this purpose and the steps proposed to be taken in this regard;

(g) whether the Government propose to fix time limit for it; and

(h) if so, the details thereof?

THE MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (DR. SHAKEEL AHMAD)

(a) For urban areas, telephone facilities have been provided in all the districts of Rajasthan. For rural areas, out of 41515 revenue villages in Rajasthan (as per 1991 census), in 23880 villages telephone facilities have been provided by BSNL and in 3010 villages by Shyam Telelinks Limited, private basic service operator in Rajasthan.

(b) The list of number of villages, district-wise, where telephone facilities have not been provided are given in Annexure-I.

(c) The total waiting list as on 15-07-2004 in rural areas of Rajasthan is 119007. District-wise details are given in Annexure-II.

(d) Most of the rural connections are loss making for the service providers and therefore, there is a general reluctance among all service providers to increase their exposure in rural areas.

(e) Efforts are being made to provide telephone connections to wait-listed applicants, particularly, in rural areas using mostly the WLL technology.

Target fixed for provision of DELs in rural areas of Rajasthan in the year 2004-05 are:

Land line : 30,000
WLL : 1,50,000

 S.N Name of No. of o. District uncovered villages 1.Ajmer 29 2.Alwar 861 3.Banswara 838 4.Dungarpur 312 5.Barmer 1005 6.Bharatpur 483 7.Dholpur 451 8.Bhilwara 500 9.Bikaner 202 10.Bundi 314 11.Chittorgarh 1391 12.Churu 236 13.Jaipur 1143 14.Dausa 527 15.Jaisalmer 239 16.Jhalawar 885 17.Jhunjhunu 9 18.Jodhpur 256 19.Kota 147 20.Baran 357 21.Nagaur 428 22.Pali 147 23.Sawai Madhopur 197 24.Karauli 382 25.Sikar 181 26.Sirohi 104 27.Jalore 144 28.Sriganganagar 1886 29.Hanumangarh 748 30.Tonk 374 31.Udaipur 1250 32.Rajsamand 195 Grand Total: 16221	ANNEXURE-II STATUS OF RURAL WAITING LIST IN RAJASTHAN S.N Name of the Waiting List o. Revenue District 1. Ajmer 3460 2. Alwar 10356 3. Banswara 869 4. Baran 975 5. Barmer 5778 6. Bharatpur 3441 7. Bhilwara 2595 8. Bikaner 1099 9. Bundi 464 10. Chittorgarh 3362 11. Churu 5072 12. Dausa 3211 13. Dholpur 1083 14. Dungarpur 1733 15. Hanumangarh 2154 16. Jaipur 9165 17. Jaisalmer 441 18. Jalore 3266 19. Jhalawar 923 20. Jhunjhunu 9062 21. Jodhpur 6335 22. Karauli 1481 23. Kota 1150 24. Nagaur 10165 25. Pali 4686 26. Rajsamand 1983 27. Sawaimadhopur 1772 28. Sikar 12253 29. Sirohi 1696 30. Sriganganagar 2214 31. Tonk 1063 32. Udaipur 5700 Circle Total: 119007