New Delhi: The Government today (Oct 20, 2004) announced a Rs 1000 crore plan for connecting all State Government offices down to the block level through a fibre optic network for facilitating communication.

"The Rs 1,000 crore plan will run through next five years and the State Governments which have run at least three e-governance projects with at least one covering the entire State will be eligible for assistance," Union IT and Communications Minister Dayanadhi Maran said while announcing the plan.

Under the plan, all capital expenses to connect State Government offices with high-speed reliable network with a minimum capacity of 2mbps will be borne by the Centre, he said.

Bandwidth costs will have to be borne by the States. The State-owned telecom provider Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd, which has fibre down to the block level, has agreed to provide 90 per cent discount to the State Governments if they agree to buy all telecom services from it, the Minister said.

The implementing agency for the project will be the Department of Information Technology (DiT) and National Informatics Centre.

"The State Government will, however, have the freedom to choose the agency it wants to hand over the implementation of State Area Wide Networks (SWAN)," Maran said.

When the States manage to network all their offices, they would be brought on a national fibre optic backbone, he said.