New Delhi: Seeking to turn tables on Congress over the call drops issue, Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on September 30 said this problem is a legacy of the last government and he is clearing the "mess" left by them. He also said that Congress must be asked why state-owned BSNL and MTNL turned loss-making entities during the UPA regime. Addressing a press conference on the call drop menace, Prasad said he is clearing the mess left by the Congress-led UPA government and during their tenure the Sanchar Bhawan - the seat of Telecom Ministry - was known for all the wrong reasons including "corruption, loot and impropriety".
The Congress had on September 29 demanded sacking of Telecom Minister for his "incompetence" in resolving the issue of frequent call drops experienced by consumers. Congress General Secretary Shakeel Ahmed had said it was becoming difficult to talk on mobile "for even five seconds" and the problem was more in the networks of state-owned MTNL and BSNL.
Responding to the Congress' charge, Prasad said, "Call drop is also a legacy of previous government. We inherited it. The weakness in telecom sector that came due to lack of monitoring...call drop came from other factors... lack of network improvement, optimisation of network equipment." The Minister added that BSNL and MTNL were making profit in 2004 till the time the then NDA government was in power, but the two firms became loss-making in 10 years of the Congress rule.
The Minister said that the licence agreement of mobile operators also provides for imposition of penalties on service quality parameters, but that option will be exercised as a last option. "We started monitoring in April. They (telecom operators) came on their own to show the shortcomings. I have directed my Department to conduct sample survey on their claim," Prasad said.
He added that private operators are cooperating with the government to address call drop problem and there has been improvement due to various steps taken by Telecom Ministry. "The call drop rates for Bharti Airtel were varying from 3.01 to 17.77 per cent in Delhi which has been reduced to 0.1 to 2.96 per cent... Aircel call drop has been reduced from 3.18-16.21 per cent to 0.02-0.49 per cent in some of the areas of Delhi," Prasad said.
He further said call drop on Idea Cellular network has been reduced from 3.55-7.08 per cent to 0.3-1.38 per cent, Vodafone has been able to contain it in the range of 0.3-2.15 per cent and Tata Teleservices in 0.03-2.27 per cent. The call drop problem has become acute in the last 4-5 months and even Prime Minister Narendra Modi has voiced serious concern over the issue. The government recently stepped up pressure on mobile operators to check call drops asking their promoters including Anil Ambani, Kumar Mangalam Birla and Sunil Mittal to directly intervene in the matter. It had also warned that the companies would face penal action if they fail to take corrective action.
