SAFE optic-fibre cable system in April

Kochi: The SAFE (Southern Africa-Far East-West Africa) optic-fibre cable system, which is linked with the Indian subcontinent through Kochi, is expected to become functional in the first week of April 2002.

The commissioning of the system will lead to a quantum increase in the bandwidth available for the Internet, telecom and multimedia traffic between India and the rest of the world, particularly Europe and the South African and Far-East regions. The SAFE cable system will be able to handle 7.3 million simultaneous telephone calls, 1.5 million hi-speed data channels and 12,000 digital video channels.

With the landing point for the optic-fibre cable in India being Kochi, the city can benefit from being the gateway to an international communication network, provided the information technology industry is in a position to harness its potential.

So far the rapid development of the overseas telecommunication infrastructure in Kochi by VSNL has not been accompanied by a significant growth of the IT industry in the city. VSNL represents India in a consortium of 42 telecom companies from 35 countries for providing infrastructure for a wide range of telecom and IT services under the SAFE project.

The landing of the cable in Kochi took place on 11 February 2001, when a flat-bottom cable-laying vessel brought the underwater cable to the Cherai Beach. It was then linked to the land cable that had already been laid from the beachland to VSNL's international gateway at Kakkanad.

In the sea off Kochi, one end of the cable has been connected to the main cable from Mauritius on the western side and the other end to the one towards Penang, Malaysia, on the eastern side. The cable-laying and installation of the terrestrial links and terminal equipment were completed and taken over by VSNL in December 2001. The testing of the Indian end of the network is also over, sources said.

It is the global integration of SAFE with a large optic-fibre cable network that is awaited. This larger network - SAT3/WASC/SAFE - is designed to link Europe with Southeast Asia. The other countries through which the cable passes are Spain, Portugal, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroun, Gabon, Angola, South Africa, Mauritius, Reunion and Malaysia.

It was on 17 June 1999 that VSNL joined the consortium of 42 operations in Asia, Africa and Europe to implement the $600-million SAFE project. VSNL's investment in the project was originally estimated at Rs 132 crore.