The Central government has set priorities for state-controlled Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), the new entrant to the commercial fourth-generation (4G) market, to prevent its subscriber churn to private sector telecom carriers Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea (Vi), which provide 5G services. <\/p>\n
BSNL has been tasked with extensively improving customer experience, and to back it up with marketing efforts to drive awareness and retention in the intensely competitive telecom market. <\/p>\n
\u2018The Hon\u2019ble Prime Minister Modi Ji\u2019s vision of a digitally empowered India is not complete without BSNL playing a central role,\u2019 Minister of State for Communications Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani said on Monday, following a joint high-level meeting with Union Communications Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia to review BSNL\u2019s operational strategy and progress for the fiscal year 2026.<\/p>\n
\u2018That is why revivals planned, investments made, and support has been extended. Let us become leaner, faster, and more responsive,\u2019 Pemmasani said, underscoring that swift resolution of customers\u2019 woes can rebuild trust and reduce churn. <\/p>\n
The senior ministers outlined that BSNL should establish local rapid-response teams to address network outages and connectivity issues \u201cwithin hours\u201d, particularly in rural and semi-urban areas; ensure power plants and batteries are in working order and replaced timely; deploy artificial intelligence (AI)-backed chatbots on BSNL application for instant responses to common issues; and streamline the process for new SIM activations, eSIM conversions, and plan changes through the company\u2019s mobile application or website. <\/p>\n
Most importantly, BSNL has been directed to upgrade customers from legacy networks \u2013 2G and 3G \u2013 to its modern 4G network. <\/p>\n
\u2018While the private sector brings in aggressive investments and agility, BSNL carries something they cannot replicate \u2014 the goodwill of the people, especially in areas where only BSNL has dared to go,\u2019 Pemmasani said. <\/p>\n
The telecom PSU\u2019s 4G network is being deployed across 1 lakh sites by a Tata Consultancy Services (TCS)-led consortium comprising homegrown Tejas Networks as a radio vendor and the Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DoT) as a Core network vendor, with the Tata group IT company as system integrator (SI).<\/p>\n
Pemmasani, on July 23, in a written reply in Lok Sabha, stated that as on June 30, 95,537 4G sites have been installed for BSNL, of which, 90,035 are on-air. <\/p>\n
Scindia, in turn, while setting BSNL\u2019s business targets for FY26, said that the telco should aim for a 50% growth in consumer mobility services, and a 25-30% growth in enterprise business. <\/p>\n
BSNL, after years of persistent losses, posted a net profit in the third and fourth quarters of FY25. <\/p>\n
The union minister had said BSNL also needs to focus on increasing its average revenue per user (ARPU) by enhancing customer satisfaction, cross-selling, and upselling of products. Scindia noted that BSNL\u2019s ARPUs vary from as low as \u20b940 to as much as \u20b9175 across cities.<\/p>\n
The telecom company made its largest-ever capital expenditure of around \u20b925,000 crore in the previous fiscal to deploy 4G sites across cities and villages. <\/p>\n
BSNL\u2019s marketing initiatives <\/p>\n
Parallelly, Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s government is aiming to drive BSNL services adoption in government agencies and departments, too, according to recent media reports. <\/p>\n
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has recommended states for considering utilisation of the services of BSNL and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) for internet\/broadband, landline, and leased line requirements of departments, agencies and public sector firms. <\/p>\n
According to the latest annual report from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), BSNL\u2019s subscriber base increased from 94.75 million in FY24 to 98.74 million in FY25, growing at 4% year-on-year. During this period, its market share grew from 7.9% to 8.22%, but was significantly lower than Jio’s (40.66%), Airtel’s (33.41%), and Vi\u2019s 17.17% share. <\/p>\n
Enthused by BSNL\u2019s progress, Pemmasani urged BSNL to launch hyper-local marketing campaigns in rural and semi-urban areas; introduce bundled family or group plans offering shared data, voice, and SMS benefits at competitive prices, targeting households and small businesses; intracircle roaming with various telcos with innovative packages or higher cost; and create data-heavy, budget-friendly plans tailored for students and young professionals, with perks such as free access to educational platforms or streaming services for a limited period.<\/p>\n
\u2018With the continuous support of the Government of India and the guidance of Hon\u2019ble Minister Scindia, I am confident that BSNL will reclaim its place as the leading telecom service provider in this highly competitive sector,\u2019 Pemmasani<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Central government has set priorities for state-controlled Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), the new entrant to the commercial fourth-generation (4G) market, to prevent its subscriber churn to private sector telecom carriers Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea (Vi), which provide 5G services. BSNL has been tasked with extensively improving customer experience, and to back it up with marketing efforts to drive awareness and retention in the intensely competitive telecom market. \u2018The Hon\u2019ble Prime Minister Modi Ji\u2019s vision of a digitally empowered India is not complete without BSNL playing a central role,\u2019 Minister of State for Communications Chandra Sekhar […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-950826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-telecom"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=950826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950826\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=950826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=950826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=950826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}