MUMBAI: The idea that every building plan must have a broadband cable duct should be made into a law, the union minister Manoj Sinha has been urged.

Telangana IT minister K T Rama Rao, in a letter to Sinha, said that the state expected that the categorisation of broadband service as a utility and mandating duct-laying in building would pave the way for an exponential increase in broadband penetration in India, PTI reported.

Rao said that the state had created the Telangana Fiber Grid Corporation Limited to build a broadband network to reach every home, institution and government office. Telangana Fiber Grid (T-Fiber) was envisioned to establish a top-class network infrastructure to facilitate the realisation of ‘Digital Telangana’ goal on the back of Mission Bhagiratha, a drinking water project.

Hailing the TRAI's suggestion that every building plan must have the duct, Rao requested Sinha to make that into a law to ensure that the last meter connectivity issues for broadband networks were resolved.

Rao said that they had learnt that the Telecom Commission had approved of the TRAI’s recommendation that a completion certificate (CC) to the building should only be given if it had incorporated the duct in its plan.

Rao, who is popular as KTR, also sought Sinha’s intervention in directing the ministry of urban development to give similar directive to all state governments to implement the TRAI recommendation.