Views of Mr. Mahendra Nahata, MD, HFCL

BSNL is of strategic importance to the nation and the Government’s revival package will go a long way to safeguard national interest while also promoting competition and consumer choice. The relief package of Rs. 89,000 crore for BSNL will help it emerge as a strong player, upgrade the operators network, help deleverage its balance sheet and it will be a crucial step towards ensuring growth of the telecom sector. It will further result in powering 4G networks in rural India, thereby unlocking last mile connectivity and bridging the existing digital divide.  With strong data governance practices and a robust cyber resilience framework, the revival of BSNL will help in building resilient network security solutions.

The increased authorized capital also reflects the Government’s commitment towards BSNL’s capabilities of driving a larger vision and creating a level-playing field while also developing a consumer-centric telecom landscape. This strategic decision will further encourage key players like BSNL to contribute significantly in achieving our Government’s vision of building indigenous 4G/5G India tech stack which will be a huge enabler towards encouraging indigenous manufacturing, innovation and achieve the vision of an ‘Atma Nirbhar’ Bharat. As a significant contributor in the telecommunication industry, we foresee this strategic initiative resulting in a plethora of opportunities and enable organizations like HFCL to capitalize on our combined field expertise and strong technological capabilities, to offer world-class telecom services.”