Minister of Communications and IT, Ravi Shankar Prasad has approached the Ministry of Finance to seek additional funds worth Rs 69.97 billion for executing a number of telecom projects being supported by the Universal Services Obligation (USO) Fund.

In a communication to the Ministry of Finance, Prasad has stated that the USO Fund requires additional funds worth Rs 69.97 billion to meet budgeted expenditure in 2014-15 towards the rollout of several telecom projects of national interest.

At present, the USO Fund corpus is pegged at Rs 336 billion with annual inflows worth Rs 70 billion. It requires bulk of the additional funds to meet annual costs during the current financial year for implementing the first phase of the national optic fibre network (NOFN) which aims to provide broadband connectivity to 250,000 gram panchayats. In addition, it also needs funds to support Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited in establishing mobile networks in nine naxal-hit states on a priority basis.

Further, the minister has sought additional funds to meet the funds shortfall in subsidising optic fibre connectivity across the Northeast and expanding direct exchange lines in rural areas, which will collectively entail expenses upwards of Rs 13 billion. According to Prasad while USO Fund requires
Rs 105 billion to meet the budgeted expenditure, it has funds worth Rs 3.5 billion to finance existing ventures.

Earlier, the issue regarding the shortfall of funds was taken up in a review meeting for the NOFN project. The meeting was chaired by M.F. Farooqui, secretary, Department of Telecommunications, who suggested that the Department of Expenditure under the Ministry of Finance should be tapped for additional funds to finance projects being supported by the USO Fund.