The government has no plan to take over cash-strapped Vodafone Idea (Vi), minister of state for communications Devusinh Chauhan informed the Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
“No such proposal is under consideration in the Department,” Chauhan said, replying to a question if the government has any plan to take over the loss-making telecom operator.
The government became the largest stakeholder in Vi with a 33.1% stake in February this year, when the telecom department converted the company’s accrued interest on deferred adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues worth Rs 16,133 crore into equity.
But the government has been maintaining that it took the step solely to offer financial relief to Vi and that it doesn’t plan to either run or take control of the telco, which is desperately trying to raise funds via equity and debt.
Despite being the largest shareholder, the government does not interfere in the day-to-day affairs of the joint venture between UK’s Vodafone Group PLC and India’s Aditya Birla Group (ABG). The company has been granted various extensions to make statutory payments as it has been paying interest on the delay.
Responding to a query on state-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. (BSNL), Chauhan said as per the government’s Atmanirbhar initiative, the telco has placed purchase orders for 100,000 indigenously developed sites to start 4G services.
“The telecom services provided by BSNL are meeting most of the quality of service (QoS) parameters as per performance monitoring report (PMR) of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI),” he said, adding that to significantly improve the quality and speed of data services, BSNL is in process of rolling out 4G services.
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