BSNL TO COME FORWARD WITH A NEW
OFFER OF LIMITED MOBILITY PHONE FOR Rs. 20
GOVERNMENT
TO LOOK INTO INTRA CIRLE MERGERS/ACQUISITIONS
CONSULTATIVE
COMMITTEE OF THE MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
MEETS
The Public Sector
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) will come out with a scheme
to offer Limited Mobility Phones at a maximum of Rs.20/-. Disclosing
this at the Parliamentary Consultative Committee Meeting of the
Ministry of Communications and Information Technology here today,
Shri Arun Shourie said Rs.20/- would be charged only as an insurance
amount. He said the benefit of the policy initiatives taken by
the Government have engineered fierce competition among the service
providers which has benefitted the customers. Stating that telecom
tariffs have come down by as much as 64 percent, the Minister
said the public sector BSNL and MTNL have been given full freedom
to compete.
The Minister said
the case for intra-circle merger and acquisitions is being looked
into. He said the efforts will be made to see that there are no
monopolies while these telecom companies remain financially intact.
Shri Shourie said that one of the ways could be that there are
minimum of three operators in a circle and nobody has more than
30 percent of the spectrum. Giving a blueprint of the future policy
initiative in spectrum, the Minister said efforts will be made
for a unified license regime over a period of time without actually
hurting the existing licensees.
To promote transparency
and avoid controversy, the Minister said that the BSNL and MTNL
are coming out with a purchase manual. This new manual will be
released tomorrow.
On rural telephony,
the Minister said new technology options have to be tried. Shri
Shourie said to provide telephones in the rural areas on individual
basis will be continuously loss making proposition. He also indicated
that Department of Telecom will sign a Memorandum of Understanding
(MoU) with Railtel to utilise the wide network of Railways. The
Minister said that there is a need to have a relook at the functioning
of agencies like C-DoT, Hindustan Cables and ITI with Department
of Telecom as they can survive only if they go in for new technologies.
Presentations were made on spectrum
management and new technologies for rural telephony. The presentation
was made by Dr. S.G. Dhande, Director, IIT, Kanpur and his colleagues.
Participating in
the Meeting, several Members stressed the need to revamp rural
telephony and WLL services. They also pointed out the intra region
disparity on rural telephony. They wanted that the quality of
service should be improved.
Members who attended
the meeting include: Shri Ramanand Singh, Shri Padamsen Chaudhary,
Shri Gordhanbhai Javiya, Shri Laxmanrao Patil, Shri Sukhdeo Paswan,
Shri Ajay Singh Chautala, Shri Bhan Singh Bhaura, Shri S. Ajaya
Kumar, Shri Sanant Kumar Mandal, Shri Suresh Jadhav, Shri D.B.Atkinson,
Col.Sona Ram Choudhary, Shri Rajo Singh, Shri K. Muraleedharan,
Shri Shriniwas Patil, Smt. Sangeeta Singh Deo, Smt. Ratna Singh,
Shri Rupchand Pal and Shri K.P. Singh Deo (All Lok Sabha Members);
Shri Nilotpal Basu, Shri Anil Sharma, Shri B.P. Singhal, Shri
S.S. Ahluwalia, Smt. Maya Singh, Shri Suresh Bhardwaj and Shri
B.J. Panda. (All Rajya Sabha Members).
