The government on Thursday said that it was monitoring the progress for launch of 4G by Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) on a daily basis, it commits to launch the services ‘at the earliest’.

“All I can commit to you is, along with Tejas, BSNL, TCS (Tata Consultancy Services) and C-DOT (Centre For Development Of Telematics)...we are forming a PMU (project management unit) and that PMU will not set monthly targets, not weekly targets, I have mandated to set daily targets, and those daily targets will be monitored ourselves, by Secretary and myself. So, I can commit you at the earliest,” Jyotiraditya Scindia, Minister of Communications told reporters here.

The State-owned company is the only one which has no 4G services yet in the country.

Speaking on the sidelines of the theme launch of upcoming India Mobile Congress, 2024, scheduled to be held in October, he said, “The important aspect for you to think about is whether one should have a sense of national pride or not...It was very easy for BSNL to go down that route...but what does the Prime Minister say, that ‘India must not only be the supplier of services, but we must become the supplier of products’. So what do you do? You chose the harder way out. That I will develop my own 4G stack in India,” he noted.

He said that the government was on track with 100,000 RANs (radio access networks) that it needs to have in place, for the earliest launch of 4G by BSNL.

Meanwhile, Scindia also confirmed the handing over debt-laden MTNL’s operations to BSNL.

“What we have said is very clear and what we have said is that operations will be transferred to BSNL. Monetisation of assets will take place to pay off the liabilities. In the interim of monetisation of assets and some bonds coming due, the sovereign guarantee bonds stand good. Government of India stands behind those bonds and there will be no default,” he added.

Related Topics