from daijiworld's special correspondent
 
Panaji, Jul 20: Every household in Goa would connected through common broadband-based, statewide area network to the capital by the end of the next year, Information technology minister Dayanand Narvekar told the state legislative assembly on Wednesday.

"This is the first step Goa is going in a big way in IT sector," he said.

Narvekar said that of the 29 major companies which had taken bid documents for request of expression of interest, 11 (eleven) companies have responded and amongst them nine have been shortlisted on the minimum eligibility criteria.

Replying a question on the floor of the house, Narvekar said that major national companies have bid for the project.

Listing out various deadlines, the minister said that all district and taluka headquarters would be connected to the capital headquarter by December 31, 2006 and talukas will be connected to panchayats by March 31, 2007 by ten gigabyte cable. Later on, the panchayats would be connected to households by one gigabyte cable.

The information technology minister said that government will not invest in any money in the project and on the other hand, all nine companies will have to bid amongst themselves.