The Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) recently signed an agreement with Reliance Jio for the provisioning of 4G-based mobiles services in identified uncovered villages in aspirational districts of Andhra Pradesh, Chattisgarh, and Odisha.
As part of the agreement signed on 20th May 2022, the USP will set up and manage the mobile service sites with USOF granted subsidy. The agreement will be valid for a period of ten years from the effective date excluding 18 months (rollout period).
As part of the agreement, Reliance Jio will be setting up 3696 mobile towers in total across Odisha, Chattisgarh, and Andhra Pradesh. Andhra Pradesh, Chattisgarh, and Odisha will get 771, 546, and 2379 mobile towers installed respectively by Reliance Jio in the identified uncovered villages.
The mobile towers will have minimum backhaul bandwidth of 8 Mbps VSAT and OFC/MW of 15 Mbps along with minimum radial coverage of 4 km. The tower will have a sectoral antenna, 1+1+1 eNode-B configuration, and 40 meter GBT tower height. The tower will support data, voice, and SMS services.
