Staff Reporter
Dimapur, April 22
Protesting against the Centre for not taking concrete action to revive the sick state-owned telecom firm BSNL, employees in Dimapur today demanded the management to upgrade the facilities and enhance the services of the telecom on par with private telecom operators. The employees gathered here at Old Telephone Exchange office also appealed to the State government and MPs to extend support and take up the issue with the Centre. The nation-wide strike called by United Forum of BSNL and Joint Action Committee (JAC) of unions and association of BSNL NE-II circle entered the second day today.
Seeking public cooperation and expressing regret for the inconvenience caused to customers, JAC said, revival of BSNL is a must for the interest of the consumers.
“The central government and BSNL management are not supportive towards providing sufficient equipments and uninterrupted services” the committee said.
The committee pointed out that since 2008, BSNL has been in loss and the reason has been misinterpreted by the management with blame put on the performance of employees.
“When the government does not provide proper supplies, the services will be disrupted. Our stock is almost empty” they lamented.
On the scenario of BSNL services in Nagaland, the committee brought to light that the Department of Telecommunications (DOT) and Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) who are supposed to visit the state for atleast 18 months consider the duty in Nagaland as punishment and visit only for 8 months without even trying to understand the problem of BSNL services in the state.
“We are losing about Rs 5000-10,000 crore a year on rural landline connection just to meet government’s commitment. If government bears the cost, BSNL will make profits.”
Accusing the DOTs of lobbying with the Centre, JAC felt DOTs to be practicing anti-BSNL policies as earlier BSNL was ignored under previous UPA government and now NDA government which has attributed to accumulative loss of more than Rs 28,000 crore.
They alledged that the fund under Universal Service Obligation (USO) is also not provided as per the policy but only meager fund which is often delayed.
