State-owned telecom firm BSNL’s loss during the first half of the current financial year stood at more than ₹7,500 crore, Union Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad informed Parliament on Thursday.
During the period (April-September 2019), the PSU’s revenue stood at ₹9,034 crore. The figures, however, are unaudited.
As per the figures shared by Mr. Prasad, BSNL’s loss in fiscal 2018-19 stood at ₹14,904 crore on revenues of ₹19,321 crore. The company clocked a net loss of ₹7,993 crore on revenues of ₹25,071 crore in 2017-18.
In a written reply to Rajya Sabha, the Minister added that with the Cabinet approving the revival plan for BSNL and MTNL last month, it is expected that both the companies will turn around in future. The Union Cabinet had, in October, approved a package worth almost ₹70,000 crore for the revival of the two firms, while also giving an in-principle nod for the merger of the two entities. Replying to a separate query, Mr. Prasad said that at present, there was no proposal for disinvestment of the two firms.
Additionally, he stated that the number of customers moving to the BSNL network was higher than those opting to leave it. “BSNL has informed that number of customers who ported into BSNL is higher than the ported-out customers. BSNL’s MNP (mobile number portability) was positive during 2019-20 (till October, 2019),” Mr Prasad said.
The number of subscribers who ported in stood at 53.64 lakh against 28.27 lakh ported- out subscribers in 2018-19. The cumulative number, up to October 2019, was 2.04 crore (port-ins) against 1.80 crore (port-outs).
Asked whether the government was considering any plan for time-bound payment of salaries/wages of contract casual workers of BSNL and MTNL, the Minister said contract casual workers were engaged by contractors for specific works outsourced by the two firms.
“The responsibility of payment to the contract casual workers essentially lies with the contractor. However, due to severe financial constraints, delay in payment to contractors by BSNL/MTNL has occurred in recent months,” he said.
The Minister added that all efforts were being made by BSNL and MTNL to meet the immediate necessary expenditure, including payment of bills of contractors for making payment of wages/arrears to contract casual workers.
