The Defence Ministry has extended clearance with one-year validity to telecom companies for laying and maintaining undersea cables, the Department of Telecom said.
Earlier, telecom operators were required to seek clearance every six months for vessels and ships required for laying and maintaining undersea cables that are vital for internet and international telecom services.
“In the interest of ease of doing business, DoT took up the case with MoD (Ministry of Defence) to extend the period of their clearance from the present six months to one year.
“MoD has agreed to the proposal of DoT to grant initial and subsequent MoD security clearance of vessels and ships to one year or duration of the contract or period sought, whichever is less, subject to certain conditions,” a DoT (Department of Telecom) circular said.
International long-distance services operators are required to take clearance from the defence ministry for ships and vessels and from the home ministry for crew members to be involved in the process.
The home ministry has already been issuing clearance with one-year validity.
The circular further added “ILD operators are hereby advised to take necessary actions in line with the mentioned letter from MoD to synchronise their requests for Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA)/MoD clearances.
Submarine cable industry
Submarine communication cables account for 90 per cent of the global data traffic, exhibiting a total carrying capacity of terabits per second. It, therefore, comes as little surprise that submarine cable systems are considered of much value by leading OTT and communication providers such as Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft, according to a Future Markets Insights report.
The report further added that India is set to register the highest growth in the Asia Pacific submarine cables industry, and the market size is expected to reach US$ 78.6 million by 2030. The market in India is anticipated to create an absolute dollar opportunity of US$ 51.7 million from 2022 to 2030.
