New Delhi, May 16 (IANS): State-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) will provide third generation (3G) telecom services at affordable rates and bridge the rural-urban digital divide, company chairman and managing director Kuldeep Goyal said.

3G services facilitate faster connectivity and enable applications such as Internet TV, video-on-demand, audio-video calls and high-speed data exchange.

"By making 3G services affordable in India, BSNL is ultimately facilitating socio-economic development of the masses through applications such as telemedicine, e-education and e-governance," Goyal said on the eve of the World Telecommunication Day on May 17.

He said the company would make all efforts to bridge the rural-urban digital divide in the country.

Under the government's Bharat Nirman programme, BSNL will provide high speed wireless broadband connectivity to 11,500 common service centres and connect 50,000 such centres.

"BSNL is committed to taking India into the next league of telecom supremacy by providing technologically advanced services to its discerning customers at an affordable cost. In the emerging digital communications era, BSNL is optimising its quality telecom network," he said.

At present, BSNL offers services in 354 cities in the northern, eastern and southern parts of the country, except Delhi and Mumbai, and has 1.25 million subscribers.