The government has taken a Tk 676-crore project to expand the 3G network of Teletalk to all upazilas, growth centres and educational institutions, and 2.5G network to all villages.

The project got the approval at yesterday's meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council.

To build the network, around 1,200 base stations will be set up and High Speed Packet Access will be installed to improve the existing 3G capacity.

Some 500 base transceiver stations (BTS) will be set up to improve the 2.5G network in rural areas.

To implement the project, assistance from the Chinese government was sought; but after the lack of a positive response, the government decided to run the project with its own resources, said a planning ministry official.

The project, once it is completed in 2017, is expected to bump up the state-run mobile operator's subscriber base by 17 lakh.

Teletalk will be able to compete with the market giants after the completion of the project, said Tarana Halim, state minister for telecom.

Teletalk received the 3G licence one year earlier than the other private operators, but the state-run operator could not play a big role in the market due to poor investment for network development, she said. “Now things will change.”

Earlier, another project was taken for the expansion of the 3G network whose tenure ended in 2015.

Some 1,562 BTS towers were set up, through which 3G network was rolled out in all divisional and district headquarters.

Another 2,100 BTS towers were installed through which 2.5G network was introduced in the upazilas. 

About 65 lakh subscribers were created through the project, according to the planning ministry.

Also at yesterday's meeting, a Tk 1,278-crore project got a go-ahead for the expansion and upgradation of the electricity distribution system in west zone.

After the completion of the construction of the Padma bridge in 2018, the demand for electricity would increase a lot, said Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal after the meeting.

“This project has been taken up to meet the impending demand,” he added.

The project is scheduled for completion in 2020.

Besides, Ecnec also approved three revised projects whose costs were increased two to four times and deadlines extended.

The project for setting up power generation units and sugar refinery using a co-generation system at the North Bengal Sugar Mills was taken up in 2014, when the estimated cost was Tk 73.47 crore and the completion deadline was 2016.

But as of March this year, only 2.53 percent of the fund has been spent.

The Ecnec revised the cost upwards to Tk 324 crore and extended the deadline to 2018.

The planning ministry proposal said the costs soared as three new components were added to the project.

Another project whose allocation was increased is the Baniachong-Ajmeriganj Road Construction one. Its costs have been raised to Tk 116 crore from the earlier estimate of Tk 73.09 crore.