Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is collaborating with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) to implement 4G services in India. Contrary to the statement made by India’s IT and Telecom Minister, Ashwini Vaishnaw, in 2023, indicating that BSNL had initiated the rollout of the 4G network with 200 sites and planned to scale it up after a three-month trial, BSNL’s Employee Union (EU) challenges this claim. In a letter addressed to Vaishnaw, the BSNL EU asserts that TCS has yet to complete the 4G field trials.
According to the letter, “the commissioning of BSNL’s 4G equipment by TCS is getting unbearably delayed. So far, TCS has not even completed the field-level trials of its 4G equipment. No one knows when the field trials would get completed, and TCS would start the commissioning of BSNL’s 4G equipment.”
In reality, TCS is anticipated to conclude the field trials only by October 2024. The EU reported that CMD PK Purwar mentioned, “the commissioning of BSNL’s 4G equipment by TCS would be completed by October 2024. This target date of October 2024 itself is too long, considering the dire situation in which BSNL has been placed. However, it seems that meeting this target date itself has now become impossible.”
The employee union expresses concern that BSNL is losing customers due to its inability to compete with private telecom companies in the absence of 4G services. The delay in the deployment of this technology has resulted in BSNL losing a significant number of customers each month, as indicated by TRAI data.
“It is needless for us to state that BSNL is facing such a dire situation only because of its inability to provide high-speed data service to its customers. While Reliance Jio and Airtel have already rolled out their 5G services throughout the country, BSNL is struggling to compete with them with 2G & 3G technologies. The launching of BSNL’s 4G service is getting terribly delayed, and the same is nowhere in sight,” remarked the EU.
