The 5G upgrade twill rely entirely on India’s homegrown telecom stack
In sum – what to know:
Nationwide upgrade – BSNL aims to upgrade all 4G towers to 5G within eight months, signaling a rapid, nationwide move toward next-generation connectivity.
Homegrown stack – The upgrade leverages India’s indigenous technology ecosystem built by C-DOT, Tejas Networks, and TCS, reducing dependence on foreign vendors.
India’s state-run telecom operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) will upgrade all of its indigenous 4G towers to 5G within six to eight months, local press reported, citing the country’s Communications Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, as saying.
Scindia emphasized that the upgrade to 5G technology will rely entirely on India’s homegrown telecom stack, developed by C-DOT, Tejas Networks, and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).
“When BSNL advanced down the route of executing on 4G, there was a difficult decision to make. The easy path was to buy equipment from foreign vendors which are only four in the world; the difficult path was to invent our own 4G stack,” the minister said.
“In just 22 months, we developed our own core software, radio access network, and had an Indian system integrator in TCS,” he added.
Scindia stated that India now boasts the fastest 5G rollout globally, covering 99.8% of districts. The operator’s subscriber base currently reaches 91 million, while BSNL’s 4G footprint has expanded from 9,000 sites in mid-2024 to 98,000, now serving over 22 million users across India.
In June, the Indian government confirmed that BSNL was planning to deploy another 100,000 4G towers across the country.
In August 2025, the government committed an additional capital injection to strengthen BSNL’s network infrastructure.
BSNL plans to roll out 5G services in Delhi and Mumbai by December 2025, local press recently eported, citing a senior official from the country’s Department of Telecommunications (DoT).
The report noted that the equipment used for the operator’s indigenously developed network has reportedly performed well during testing and is being readied for commercial deployment.
“All the equipment is working fine without any issues; therefore, we estimate the commercial launch of 5G services in both cities by December 2025,” the official said.
