Railtel Launches PM-WANI Across 10 Railway Stations Of NFR

HT Bureau

GUWAHATI, May 11: RailTel, a ‘Mini Ratna (Category-I)’ Central Public Sector Enterprise under Ministry of Railways, is one of the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in the country owning a Pan-India optic fibre network covering several towns & cities and rural areas of the country. RailTel is working towards creating a knowledge society at various fronts and has been selected for implementation of various mission-mode projects for the government of India in the telecom field.

RailTel, on Monday launched Prime Minister Wi-Fi Access Network Interface (PM-WANI) scheme based access of its public Wi-Fi services across 100 railway stations having 2,384 Wi-Fi hotspots. These stations are spread in 22 states and include 71 category A1, A stations and 29 stations of other categories.

Out of the 100 railway stations across India, 10 railway stations are within the jurisdiction of NF Railway. These Railway stations are named as Siliguri, New Jalpaiguri, Darjeeling, Ghoom, Goalpara Town, Kamakhya, Guwahati, Agartala, Dharmanagar & Panisagar. To access this Wi-Fi network, an android based mobile app named ‘Wi-DOT’ can be used which is available on Google Play Store.

RailTel’s Wi-Fi network, spread across 6,102 railway stations across India, has 17,792 Wi-Fi hotspots, and is still growing. PM-WANI based access of RailTel’s public Wi-Fi services would be extended to all 6,102 railway stations (where Wi-Fi facility is already available) in phased manner by the end of June 2022 (total 1,000 stations by 10^th June, 3000 stations by 20^th June and all 6,102 by 30^th June’22).

Wi-Fi hotspot plays a key role in last mile connectivity for delivering broadband internet access to users. PM-WANI is an ambitious program of the Department of Telecom, government of India to facilitate ease of use and proliferate broadband usage for masses. C-DOT has designed and developed the framework of PM-WANI and NF Railway, as a zone to which Indian Railways will be highly benefited by this PM-WANI scheme in the near future.