New Delhi: Union Minister for IT and Telecom Ashwini Vaishaw said state-owned BSNL will use around Rs 53,000 crore to upgrade its network to 4G and 5G this year and will also revamp its landline network across the country.
The government will invest Rs 52,937 crore in BSNL during the next fiscal year starting April 1, 2023.
The minister, while talking on Budget 2023-24, said that this investment is part of Rs 1.64 lakh crore revival package announced last year and most of the balance sheet items of BSNL have already been addressed.
“BSNL has raised new debt using the sovereign guarantees which were announced in the package. Now, the physical installation of new towers, upgradation from 2G, 3G to 4G and 5G and a major revamp in the landline systems of the MTNL and BSNL network will be taken up in this year using the capital allocation of Rs 53,000 crore which has been made for BSNL,” Vaishnaw said.
The government has allotted Rs 1.23 lakh crore for postal and telecom projects. Total allocation includes Rs 97,579.05 crore for the Department of Telecom and Rs 25,814 crore for Postal projects.
The government has allocated Rs 2,158 crore for Optical Fibre Cable based network for Defence Services and Rs 715.8 crore for telecom projects in the North Eastern states.
Nirmala Sitharaman, Finance Minister, announced the setting up of 100 labs for developing applications using 5G services in engineering institutions.
