Prof. J. P. Misra has overseen internet services in BITS since their inception in 1997, when the demand could be satisfied by a VSAT link providing 128 kbps to a single room in FD3. Broadband requirements have grown exponentially since then, and despite Prof. Misra’s best efforts, have outpaced the resources the campus can provide. The primary reason for the failure to meet the ever-growing needs of the student body is the remote location of Pilani. The lack of connectivity in Pilani has proved to be a hindrance in not only acquiring new ISPs but also in getting them to provide more bandwidth. Three separate ISPs were approached after last semester’s debacle, with Reliance Telecommunications being finalised to provide an additional 500 Mbps. The lack of infrastructure, not only in Pilani but also in neighbouring areas such as Jhunjhunu and Chirawa, delayed Reliance, and BSNL provided 155 Mbps in the interim. While the campus is currently operating well below capacity, link testing for Reliance’s services has already began and Prof. Misra is optimistic that they’ll soon be operational.

Internet speeds are only part of the problem, of course. Several sites being banned or throttled has led to much frustration among the students. While the blocking of social media and communication applications is understandable, throttling of sites such as GitHub, a vital resource for those working on open-source projects, has no similar justification. Prof. Misra explained that the process of blocking websites is entirely automated. IPC manually intervenes only under exceptional circumstances, with most websites throttled based on the traffic they generate. He commented that this problem would not exist if students use the available resources more judiciously, citing a study made by IPC, where it was found that less than 10% of all data is used for academic purposes.

BITS internet connectivity also compares unfavourably with other premier institutes around the country, most notably the IITs, whose broadband capacity runs into several Gbps. The Prof. claimed that such comparisons are unfair given the vast gulf in funding between the IITs and BITS. Despite these many concerns, Prof. Misra has ambitious plans for the upcoming semester. To counter a few students downloading disproportionately large amounts, he plans to cap each user’s daily capacity. Requests for large files will have to be made to IPC, while common downloads such as an Ubuntu mirror will be made available on an IPC server. He also mentioned how certain users might be given unrestricted access to select apps. While details have not been finalised, the Unit Chief hopes these measures will go a long way in ensuring a better experience for all parties concerned.

There has also been a noticeable shift to Wi-Fi, with all the renovated Bhawans being equipped with routers instead of LAN ports. While this ensures additional mobility, and allows more than one device to be operational of the same connection, the consensus is that net speed has suffered due to this shift. Prof. Misra said that the move was made keeping the future in mind, with an increasing number of laptops lacking a LAN port. With most students now carrying multiple electronic devices, a shift to Wi-Fi was the only logical move. He hopes that Wi-Fi in Bhawans was only the first step in getting seamless Wi-Fi connectivity throughout campus.