Shillong, Aug 16: The Department of Telecommunications (DoT), North East Licenced Service Area (NE LSA), Shillong has announced the commissioning of three new towers with state-of-the-art technology, for citizens of the rural areas of the state of Meghalaya under Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) at Panchiring A in South West Khasi Hills District and at Mawpen and Katradua in East Khasi Hills District.

Villagers of seven villages namely Panchiring A, Mawpen, Katradua, Mawhati, Phodkroh, Panchiring B, and Upper Panchiring will now avail the state-of-the-art telecom services through high-speed 4G mobile broadband services for accessing various e-Governance initiatives of the Governments at Centre and State. With this, the total mobile coverage is extended to 5540 villages in Meghalaya by various licensees of DoT.

During the last year, 368 new towers, 743 new Base Transceiver Stations (BTSs) have been added and 507 uncovered villages have been provided with mobile services in the state of Meghalaya.

Ravi Goel, Senior Deputy Director General & Head of NE LSA of DoT on this occasion informed that extension of 4G services under DoT’s ambitious ‘4G Saturation Program’ to additional 1512 villages of Meghalaya has been proposed by DoT NE LSA and is under consideration of DoT HQ & USOF.

He also informed that to assure the public safety from EMF radiations, India has implemented 10 times stricter norms than those prescribed by ICNIRP and for ensuring the same, DoT NE LSA regularly tests the BTSs for compliance to these EMF norms, and till date 3557 out of 7190 BTSs have been tested in Meghalaya state and all of these have been found compliant to the norms.