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Global report recommends extension of broadband by 2015
NEW DELHI: While today 75 per cent of all households have a TV, only 25 per cent have Internet access. In the developing countries, home Internet penetration is as low as 12 per cent.
The World Telecommunication Development Report 2010 released in India recently has noted that while major achievements have been made over the past five years, substantial efforts are required in developing countries to achieve the goals and targets by 2015.
The report makes three main recommendations on the policies and measures needed to help achieve the targets: ensure that half the world population has access to broadband by 2015; Build an ICT-literate society globally; develop online content and applications.
For this, governments can take a number of concrete steps such as ensuring access to broadband infrastructure for all citizens. Policy-makers in developing countries, in partnership with the international community, should continue to commit resources to connecting educational institutions to ICTs and to adapt the curriculum. The development of online content and applications in local languages should be promoted, for example, through the digitization of books and documents to create an e-culture. With more than half of the Internet users speaking languages with non-Latin scripts, the recent opening up of Internet domain names to non-Latin script characters is an important development.
Finally, highlighting the importance for setting clear policy targets and monitoring progress, the Report proposes a list of 50 concrete indicators to monitor the targets over the next five years, until 2015.
The report comes in the wake of a consultation paper by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India expressing concern that broadband penetration in India is low in spite of the fact that 104 telecom service providers are providing broadband services. The broadband penetration is just 0.74% when compared with teledensity of 52.74%. A need is being felt to identify impediments and create an environment to encourage broadband growth.The net broadband addition per month is just 0.1 to 0.2 million in contrast to approximately 18 million mobile connections per month.
Though 70% of Indian population lives in rural areas; broadband facility is limited to metro and major cities. Availability of broadband is critical for development of rural areas. Out of total 9.0 million broadband subscribers at the end of April 2010, just 5% are in rural areas. The low broadband penetration in rural areas is attributed to non availability of transmission media connectivity upto village level.
The Report further pointing to the lack of local content, in local languages says the web is still largely dominated by the English language, though only around 15 per cent of the world’s population understands it. The declining proportion of English-speaking Internet users suggests that non-English speakers are increasingly going online. The growing number of websites that are registered under country domain names is another indication for the web content diversification.
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Inshorts Group chief Deepit Purkayastha joins IAB video council for Southeast Asia and India
The co-founder and chief executive of the short-form content platform has been inducted into the IAB SEA+India Video Council, giving India a stronger voice in shaping digital video frameworks
NOIDA: India has long been the world’s most chaotic, multilingual and mobile-first digital market. Now, one of its most prominent short-video executives is getting a seat at the table where the rules are written.
Deepit Purkayastha, co-founder and chief executive of Inshorts Group, has been selected as a member of the IAB SEA+India Video Council for 2026. Run by the Interactive Advertising Bureau, the council brings together senior leaders from Southeast Asia and India to shape standards, best practices and measurement frameworks for the fast-evolving video and digital advertising ecosystem.
The timing is pointed. According to the IAMAI-Kantar Internet in India Report 2025, over 588 million Indians are now consuming short-video content, with growth increasingly driven by rural and non-metro audiences. India’s active internet user base has crossed 950 million, with 57 per cent of users now coming from rural markets. Yet the frameworks that govern how video consumption is measured and monetised were largely designed for single-language, Western markets and have struggled to keep pace with the scale, diversity and complexity of India’s digital landscape.
Purkayastha is no stranger to these debates. He already serves on the AI Council at Marketing and Media Alliance India and as co-chair of the Digital Entertainment Committee at the Internet and Mobile Association of India. His induction into the IAB SEA+India Video Council extends that influence into the global video standards arena.
Inshorts Group sits squarely at the intersection of these forces. Its flagship product, Inshorts, India’s highest-rated short news app, reaches 12 million active users with 60-word news summaries. Its sister platform, Public App, reaches 80 million monthly active users across more than 700 districts and 12 languages, serving communities that most global platforms barely register.
Purkayastha said the opportunity was about building something more representative. “India today sits at the centre of the global video ecosystem, but the frameworks that define how value is created and measured have not always kept pace with the realities of our market,” he said. “Being part of the IAB SEA+India Video Council is an opportunity to contribute to a more representative and future-ready approach, one that accounts for diversity in language, context, and user intent.”
As a council member, Purkayastha will contribute to shaping regional standards across video advertising, measurement and platform governance, with a focus on frameworks that are native to India’s multilingual, mobile-first ecosystem rather than imported from global benchmarks designed elsewhere.
For years, India has been content to play by rules written for other markets. Purkayastha’s induction is a signal that it is done waiting to be consulted and ready to start writing them.
