BSNL employees have finally taken the decision to go on indefinite strike from Wednesday. The all India strike may hit the BSNL network across the country. The employees had demanded for the urgent placement of equipment orders that is needed for expansion plan for its mobile network.

V A N Namboodiri, joint convener of BSNL and MTNL employees’ forum said:

Strike started at 0600 hours. Workers of all the associations, unions are unitedly on strike. The strike is a complete success.

According to the data, BSNL has 3.5 crore fixed lines and 2.4 crore mobile subscribers across the country. Except Mumbai and Delhi, BSNL is the largest telecom operator with different operations across India.

Earlier, the Employees had a talk with company management Telecom Minister A Raja and Department of Telecom on this matter but the talk proved as a failure and the employees decided to go on indefinite strike from Today.

The Employees union had asked for a written assurance from the Department of telecom for placing the contract for laying 45.5 million GSM lines. The lines would be later placed to the selected vendors in different region.

When the DoT drafted the letter, it ignored two crucial issues those were related that BSNL should go for 3G network and immediate placement of order for 45.5 million lines.

On Wednesday, the employees have also a plan to hold a meeting with telecom minister D Raja along with the top brass of BSNL and DoT Secretary again on this issue.

Earlier, the BSML, a public sector undertaking, was in struggle to enhance its GSM capacity through tenders. However, the recent controversy would do nothing but delay the project for a long time.

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