It is high speed, high capacity transmission facility which enables simultaneous transmission of voice, video and other, form of data at high speed of 256 kbps to 7 mbps.
These signals can be transmitted using optical fibers or wireless form of transmission system i.e. by Bluetooth, wimax, wifi or by using satellite based VSAT (Very Small Aperture Facility).
Broad band make possible value added services, such as quality distance learning programme, video conferencing, telemedicine, digital libraries and weather forecasting.
On October 13, 2004 Ministry of Communication and IT announced Broad band policy, according to which Broadband available in India will be technology neutral as broadband service provider can use either wire based or wireless transmission system to meet the demands of consumers,. According to this policy, there will be 200 millions broadband subscribers by 2010. On Jan 14, 2005, BSNL announced its broadband service as “Data one” followed by MTNL as “Triband”.