The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) on Tuesday asked service providers to specify minimum speed of broadband plan, which must be atleast 256 Kbps. The regulator in a statement said it has already written to all the service providers not to use words like ‘up to’ while specifying the speed of the plan. The service providers have also been asked to educate subscribers on broadband while offering high-speed internet connections.

While efforts are being made to ensure minimum 256 Kbps speed for broadband connections, some stakeholders have also suggested raising the minimum speed of such connections. To set future roadmap for defining broadband in the country, Trai has also released a status paper on Broadband Speed on Tuesday.

The paper has analysed broadband speed, as defined in various countries, the prevailing environment and impact of growth of broadband on the country’s economy. Also, the paper has studied the present broadband infrastructure existing in the country and implications of redefining broadband speed. Trai said the speed of the broadband connection is generally defined to indicate an average speed that can support different applications. Broadband speed is related both to the availability of the network access infrastructure as well as to appropriate content which requires such high internet speeds.

It said the important issue is to identify the parameters that derive definition of broadband and whether there is a need to modify existing broadband definition. Trai has also asked for the comments of all the stakeholders on the paper.