Telecom major Ericsson India has launched a rural wireless broadband project to provide high-speed Internet connectivity to farmers in India's villages.

The project, named Gramjyoti, has been launched in the eastern coast of Tamil Nadu in partnership with four other companies and a non-government organization. To begin with, company officials said the project would cover 18 villages and 15 small towns around Mahabalipuram.

Gramjyoti is a major initiative to provide high-speed Internet connection enabling the users to access a range of services including telemedicine, e-education, e-governance, online local information, voice and video call services, live television and entertainment.

Ericsson has tied up with several partner companies to provide various services under the project.

Thus, Edurite will provide e-education, Apollo Telemedicine Networking Foundation will provide healthcare services, One97 will provide information on local weather, seeds, fertilisers, pesticides and market rates of crops and Turner International India Private Ltd will provide live television programmes through this network. The NGO Hand-in-Hand will organise the villagers at the local level and would work as a facilitator to help the villagers effectively use the new facilities.

Ericsson's Vice-President (Marketing and Strategy), P Balaji said that the project is the first HSPA-powered rural broadband demo network that will deliver the benefits of 3G to the local population in India.

"The initiative seeks to demonstrate how the new WCDMA/HSPA technology can be a major catalyst for social and economic empowerment by bridging the digital divide and improve productivity and quality of life," he said.