Staff Reporter :
State Minister for Post and Telecommunications Tarana Halim on Monday handed over a replica of the Bangabandhu Satellite to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina at the beginning of the cabinet meeting.
The satellite is scheduled to be launched in the track on December 16 this year.
The Bangabandhu Satellite, with a capacity of 1,600 megahertz, will have 40 transponders and the physical equipment of the space capsule that measures the capacity. Half of the capacity will be reserved for the country while the rest will be rented out.
The Bangabandhu Satellite-1 is scheduled to be launched on December 16, 2017. It will take two weeks to reach its destination of the orbiter slat 119.1 degree east longitude. Earlier of this month Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) Chairman Dr. Shahjahan Mahmood said, to ensure better telecommunication services, BTRC always felt the need of having its own satellite network.
In order to materialise the dream, BTRC formed a committee in April, 2008 which was then reformed in January, 2010. This committee performed various important activities like submission of electronic filing for 1020 E and 690 E to ITU, Coordination Request (CR) notification to ITU etc, he said.
The committee also maintained a continuous liaison with ITU to perform all secretarial jobs in this regard. This is to be mentioned here that every member state of ITU has to follow ITU regulations in order to launch their satellite, said the Chairman of the regulator body.
Recognising the importance of the satellite launching preparatory activities, BTRC formulated a project with the title “Preparatory functions and Supervision in Launching a Communication and Broadcasting Satellite”-which was then approved by the government on 26 January, 2012 with an estimated project cost of Taka 8,681.51 lakh and with an implementation tenure from 01 July, 2011 to 30 June, 2015, BTRC sources said.
As the allotment process of orbital position and relevant frequencies from ITU is very complex and Bangladesh had no previous experience in satellite launching activities, the need of expert consultant to assist in the primary activities was highly felt, and a USA based consultancy firm Space Partnership International (SPI), was appointed under the project on 29 March, 2012 following proper rules and regulation, the sources added.
