It seems ‘Acche Din’(good times) is back for Odisha, which still ails from poor tele-connectivity particularly in the backward regions and Leftwing extremism-affected areas of the State.

The State which was excluded from the first phase of 5G launch in the country has now got a ray of hope with the concerned Minister doing a flip-flop.

Union IT, Communication and Electronics Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Thursday said in Puri that 5G would come very soon to Odisha and the service would be available in the first phase of the launch in October. But he didn’t name the place to be included.

He refuted the report of the State being excluded from first phase launch as ‘mischievous’ and urged everyone not to believe it. He said the 5G would provide users 10 times the speed of 4G.

Earlier reports in the national media had said the 5G services would be available in Gurugram, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Mumbai, Chandigarh, Delhi, Jamnagar, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Hyderabad, Lucknow, Pune and Gandhinagar. Among the 13 places three were in Gujarat.

No city in Odisha, including Smart City Bhubaneswar found a place in the first phase of the launch.  This had triggered deep resentment in the State as the department Minister represents Odisha in the Rajya Sabha.

The Pioneer on August 28 had filed a report on the aforesaid matter in a report  “5G launch, “Not so ‘Acche Din’ for Odisha.”

The ground reality is that leave alone 5G services, poor mobile connectivity still hampers development of the State. More than 6,000 villages still have no mobile connectivity.

During the Covid pandemic the poor and backward class students suffered the most in the State because of network problems for attending online classes.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had raised the poor tele-connectivity issue in the State at the last Niti Ayog meeting in New Delhi in August.