tc. With several utilities planning modernization and upgradation of their systems or with privatisation, restructuring and reforms, IT is going to play an increasingly important role. Other areas Some of the other areas of IT applications include education, medicine, networking of universities and academic & research facilities, high performance computing, multi-lingual applications, entertainment, media, animation, rural networks, government networks, regional networks, agriculture, trading and e-commerce, engineering & material testing, computerisation of records and their analysis. In India at present telephone density is about 1.9 per hundred population of the country which is much less compared to even some of the other developing countries of the world. With the present growth rate of about 20 per cent, by the end of 9th Plan (Year 2002), it is expected that the tele-density could reach around only three per hundred population. Since the tele-density is low, there is great potential for the growth of telephone demand with the accelerated growth of economic activities. To meet this demand, as quickly as possible, National Telecom Policy provides for private sector participation to supplement the efforts of DoT in Basic Telephone Services. Opening up of the Basic Services will be the biggest opportunity for the foreign investors. India operates one of the largest telecom networks in Asia and the 12th largest in the world comprising of over 22,212 telephone exchanges, with a total equipped capacity of 17.74 million lines and 14.54 million working telephones. The Long Distance Transmission Network has nearly 1,65,000 route kilometres of terrestrial Microwave Radio Relay & Co-axial cables and about 96,261 route kilometres of Optical Fibre Cables. Fully automatic International Subscriber Dialling (ISD) service is available to almost all the countries. The total number of stations connected to National Subscriber Dialling (NSD) is over ...
