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The Tower & infrastructure Providers Association (TAIPA) has sought the Department of Telecommunications’ intervention in clearing the dues of about ₹1,500 crore owed by Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL).
“The situation has become highly critical now with total outstanding dues from BSNL amounting to about ₹1,500 crore, which has been pending for long. Already the telecom industry is going through a financial crisis, this is an addition to the financial woes of the telecom IP-1 players who are working tirelessly for ensuring 24x7 connectivity across the country,” TAIPA Director-General TR Dua said in a letter to BSNL.
TAIPA, which has sought DoT’s intervention, has written the letter to BSNL Chairman and Managing Director PK Purwar.
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The association’s members are finding it difficult to pay BSNL’s operation and maintenance expenses and also rental to landlords where BSNL’s sites are installed.
They are also finding it difficult to pay electricity bills of BSNL sites, procure diesel, batteries and up storage devices among others.
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These challenges would lead to outage and blackouts of BSNL sites, the letter added.
TAIPA members include Indus Towers, ATC Telecom Infrastructure, Bharti Infratel and Tower Vision, while Sterlite Technologies, Space Telelink, Applied Solar Technologies and Coslight India are its associate members.
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