Bhubaneswar: Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) authorities in Odisha have urged the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to provide fourth-generation (4G) spectrum in the region at the earliest to help them serve the subscribers with better and faster Internet service.
Speaking to Orissa POST, BSNL authorities said that they are already running the 4G service in two towns in the state – Balangir and Bhawanipatna, using 3G spectrum (suitable for 3G and 4G) temporarily to increase Internet speed. “We have not covered the entire areas in these towns, but have made 4G service possible using 3G spectrum. Presently, we are offering 4G Internet service at 150 mbps speed. However, this spectrum cannot provide both 3G and 4G service, so we have shut down the 3G service at these places.”
“Since there are less numbers of BSNL users in these two areas, we thought of providing 4G service by cancelling the 3G service from the spectrum. But we cannot use the same spectrum for 4G service in cities like Bhubaneswar where we have large number of subscribers,” the authorities explained.
Meanwhile, the BSNL employee unions staged sit-ins for not allotting spectrum for 4G services to BSNL, thereby preventing the government service provider from competing against Reliance Jio.
Recently, Reliance Jio turned out to be a major telecom service provider in the state in terms of adding new subscribers and 4G download speed.
According to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) report, Jio is the only telecom service provider to have a net addition of new customers in Odisha for December 2018. Jio added 3.13 lakh customers in December 2018, while BSNL lost 18,133 mobile subscribers in December. Also, the TRAI report claims that Jio achieved 20.9 mbps average download speed in the month of February, witnessing an improvement from 18.8 mbps in January.
Recent media reports claimed that the Department of Telecom has sent a communication to the sector regulator TRAI seeking its views on the possibility of giving 4G spectrum to BSNL outside auction area under a preferential equity infusion route. However, the telecom regulator has not received any communication from the government seeking its view on allotment of 4G airwaves to the state-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL).
PNN
