The Department of Telecom (DoT) on Monday said that of 34,600 telecom towers operating poorly, about 16,962 have improved their performance and the rest are in progress.
The initiative is in response to the demand for addressing the issue of call drops. Due to wide spread complaints, the government has conducted a special audit of cell towers.
The telecom department is monitoring the telecom service quality on a weekly to 10-day basis with all operators.
An official press statement from the Department of Telecom on Monday said: “In the entire country, a special audit was done to adjudge their performance.”
“Out of 34,600 cell towers operating poorly, about 16,962 towers have improved and the rest are in progress. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has also been requested to consider recommending incentives and disincentives for operators for call drops.”
DoT, the apex decision making body for the Indian telecom industry, stated that the government has been taking proactive measures to address the issue of call drops from April this year and the telecom secretary took a meeting of all operators, directing them to improve the conditions.
Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad is also monitoring the efforts. Earlier, Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged the mobile phone industry to take necessary action to reduce call drop issues.
The statement added that the government has taken some important policy decisions that enable telecoms to set up telecom towers at Indian government buildings.
Telecom minister has written to the chief ministers of state governments to permit tower installation on the state government buildings also. The Kerala government has allowed telecoms to set up towers on the state government buildings.
“Even the Department of Post has been directed to do so in a transparent manner. All these initiatives have been taken in the last three to four months,” said the DoT statement.
Giving the example of the state of Bihar, the statement said: “In Bihar, in particular, in the 7th phase of BSNL expansion, 1,150 2G BTS have been planned, out of which 620 BTS have been installed and working. Against 228 3G BTS in Bihar, 120 have been commissioned and become operational.”
editor@telecomlead.com
