BBNL & BSNL officials receive warning from DoT for BharatNet's substandard quality
The senior officials of public-owned Bharat Broadband Network (BBNL) and Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) has been notified for failing to operate the government's ambitious BharatNet network by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT).
In a letter to BBNL and BSNL top executives— Sanjay Singh and Anupam Shrivastava, dated November 2, telecom secretary Aruna Sundararajan said that a disciplinary action would be taken against officials responsible for non-operational network in village blocks and attributed lack of professionalism on the part of two public sector companies which has led to poor planning and coordination between the two.
Sundararajan has further warned that the Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ambitious project is being monitored by highest levels in the government and any failure to comply with or disregard of instructions shall invite exemplary disciplinary action.
BharatNet, originally conceived under the UPA-II regime in 2012, aims to connect 2.5 lakh gram panchayats or village blocks with high-speed Internet connectivity, and has already missed various deadlines.
Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha has already revised the timeline for its completion by March 31, 2019 which, however, appeared to be challenging, and as per latest figure provided by a nodal agency BBNL, only 1.16 lakh gram panchayats are operationally up and running currently.
Sundararajan has pointed out in the letter that clear utilization targets have already been set, but the actual on-ground utilization is understood to be less than 10% of the target
BBNL has confirmed that the issue was more related to maintenance and utilization of network, and they have already alerted the officials responsible for it, whereas, BSNL maintains silence.
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