Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) might fasten up its financial conditions with some help from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT). As the telecom ministry has come under a new head, highly touted as being one of the most qualified ministers in the present cabinet, Ashwini Vaishnaw was presented with a letter from BSNL Mazdoor Sangh. The letter by the Union of BSNL employees was basically a plea to the DoT to pay the dues back to BSNL, which the DoT to owes to the public telecom company. As per the letter, these dues run north of Rs 30,000 crore.
BSNL Looking to Rehire Employees Who Were Given VRS
The letter formulated by the BSNL employees’ union wrote that the dues should be paid back to the telecom company at the earliest, which would help the telco in functioning with vigor and would also help it in taking care of its employees. As per the report of ET Telecom, the said amount includes a Viability Gap Funding of Rs 13,789 crore. In addition, there is also the Rs 8,300 crore amount for the surrendered CDMA and Wimax spectrum. Lastly, an aid of Rs 1,051 crore for the BharatNet project.
BSNL Union Demands Fast Repayment of Dues
BSNL has been caught up in the loop of poor decision-making and abrupt management. Back in 2019, the government had approved a Rs 69,000 crore package for the telecom company to get it back on its track and leading forward towards a merger of MTNL and BSNL. This also included giving VRS to the employees, which almost 50% of the BSNL workforce opted for. However, now after seeing the wrath of operational losses, BSNL is looking to rehire some of these employees. Not only this, BSNL faced criticism from the center on its poor marketing techniques, which were leading to the loss of subscribers. Also, not to mention the delay in 4G network rollout, which is slated to happen robustly at least almost a year from now,
