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HYDERABAD, Oct. 17

BHARAT Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) has opened up yet another line of service — call centres.

The new avatar called, ``CallMe'', to serve the four southern States was launched here. It would be replicated in other zones of the country shortly.

Announcing this, the Chairman and Managing Director of BSNL, Mr Prithipal Singh, said CallMe, would be the first integrated one-stop call centre for the mobile telephone services (the CellOne brand) in the entire South and also basic telephony services of BSNL in Andhra Pradesh.

Among other initiatives to follow are the lifting of long pending freeze on extending dial up connections and launching of DIAS (direct Internet access service) which enables a telephone user to use it both as a phone and a Internet access facility simultaneously, he told newspersons on Wednesday.

The call centre, established in technical tie up with ITI and Siemens with an outlay of Rs 5.5 crore, has the capability to be upgraded to a 100-seat facility from the current 50-seater space, and will serve Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Kerala backed by a multi-lingual interface. The call centre will be extended to all basic services consumers as well in a phased manner across the country.Describing this initiative as a first step towards providing cellular services, Mr Singh said that the corporation has also called for tenders and will shortly choose a vendor to provide complex billing solutions for the diverse requirements of the customers encompassing its wide range of services.

Despite the entry of private telecom operators in the country, both cellular and basic services penetration has not increased much. As against this, BSNL will take off with a capacity to provide four million cellular phones in the next one year and will further provide facility to double this number, he said.

"After the scheduled launch of BSNL's cellular services by the Prime Minister, Mr A.B. Vajpayee, on November 19 from Lucknow, we will be able to reach out our services to about 500 cities and towns by December end this year and provide service in another 500 cities and towns by March 2003. There have been some apprehensions about the BSNL's capability to provide country-wide cellular services. But let me assure you that we are well prepared for the launch and will redefine the cellular telephony services in the country," he said.

BSNL is changing from normal voice-based telephony to a host of value-added services, including providing broadband access to people across the country. This will enable users to access services on demand on interactive television sets.

With regard to triggering off a tariff war following its cellular services launch, Mr Singh said that already the tariffs have come down significantly. The competition may impact the tariffs marginally. But the distinguishing factor would be the range of value-added services that the operator can extend to the customer.

On the launch of cellular services in Andhra Pradesh, the General Manager of Andhra Pradesh Telecom, Mr K.A. Ramaiah, said that the Corporation plans to offer them in the first week of November in some select town in the State.

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