New Delhi, Sep 3 (IANS) Government, industry and global experts called for a secure, interoperable, and technology-neutral critical communications architecture at the Critical Communications India Conference that concluded on Thursday.
Harinder Kumar, Secretary, TRAI, urged a coordinated push to ensure that interoperable critical communications capability reaches every intended user.
Broadband India Forum (BIF), in association with the Critical Communications Association (TCCA) held the conference.
“Critical communications is a complex ecosystem and the requirements differ for different kinds of disasters. India has made significant progress in strengthening public warning systems but the focus must now shift towards ensuring that these capabilities reach every intended user and continue evolving with technology,” Kumar said.
“We also need to understand why captive private networks have not yet scaled in the country and address the barriers to their adoption,” he added.
Kumar urged DoT, the Ministry of Home Affairs, disaster management agencies and telecom service providers to collaborate to build hardened telecom infrastructure in disaster-prone areas.
The Conference brought together senior representatives from government, regulators, public safety and disaster management agencies, standards organisations and the global mission-critical communications industry.
The conference focused on aspects of proof of concept, interoperability of networks and devices along with the evolution of the next generation of device ecosystems.
It also focused on control centers and aspects related to backward compatibility with legacy devices along with the interoperability and implementation pathways for next-generation critical communications networks.
Experts discussed whether India should have a dedicated BB-PPDR Network or should utilise the capacity of the existing operators’ commercial network.
Participants stressed the importance of seamless interoperability, priority communications for first responders, operational resilience and extensive field testing to ensure that systems perform reliably in the worst of times.
Participants deliberated the successful Proof of Concept undertaken by the state level police and public safety agencies in coordination with Directorate of Coordination Police Wireless (DCPW) at 6 different locations spread across different geographies and terrains and climatic conditions.
An expert session emphasised the valuable operational learnings from extensive user trials, and the importance of continued stakeholder engagement to support future deployment.
—IANS
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