Resolution by AITUC General Council against privatisation of BSNL
Resolution
The announcement by the Finance Minister during the recent budget of a package of ₹86,000 crores to BSNL took everyone by surprise. Till then all BSNL news was of a dying PSU, that even the staunch supporters of PSUs found hard to keep up with.
Ever since BSNL was formed out of the Ministry of Telecommunications in 2000, with various promises from the government, it is a story of broken premises: interest free non-returnable working capital of ₹7,500 crores was snatched back and a total of Rs 42000 crores along with interest was taken by the Government from BSNL, wiping out all its reserves, not allowing it to bid for 2G, 3G when others were given those licences, forcing BSNL to approach the high court to demand level playing field, making BSNL pay for the use of its own 66000 towers, while the Government paid for other private players and so on. The employees, who were assured of pension out of Government funds, protection of their salaries, etc. were driven out – 80000 of them – on VRS (which actually was compulsory retirement scheme, CRS).
Till a couple of months back, BSNL did not even have 4G facility. Then all the 3 private players, Jio, Airtel and Vodafone, increased their rates by 20% to 28%, without any reference to the Government or the Regulator and for the first time in years, customers ported back to BSNL! This reminds one of the drop in tariff rates that entry of BSNL cause: from ₹15 per call to ₹1.5 per call. Now this announcement by the FM!
But the inside story is this: the huge package is meant for TATA under the guise of BSNL. TATA will use this money to pay for 4G equipment being manufactured by a PSU which will sell that equipment cheap to TATA. As for some 500 or more land parcels owned by BSNL across the country, they have been put up for sale by the government. No one knows as of now, what happens to the sale proceeds.
So, TATA is the crony this time, not Adani!
AITUC General Council being held in Visakhapatnam, from 1 to 3 September, 2024 denounces this insidious plan of the Modi Government to loot and then privatise a PSU like the BSNL. AITUC resolves to do its utmost to expose this plan and also resolves to try and run BSNL as a Workers’ Cooperative, but not allow it to die or go out of Public Sector.