Lok Sabha Question No. 3659 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2016-12-07
Subject: Mobile Towers of Telecom PSUs
Ministry: COMMUNICATIONS
Asked by: VIRENDER KASHYAP, RAJESH KUMAR DIWAKAR, RAM TAHAL CHOUDHARY, LAXMAN GILUWA

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS

## LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO.3659 TO BE ANSWERED ON 7 TH   DECEMER, 2016

## MOBILE TOWERS OF TELECOM PSUs

3659.  SHRI VIRENDER KASHYAP:

SHRI RAJESH KUMAR DIWAKER: SHRI RAM TAHAL CHOUDHARY: SHRI LAXMAN GILUWA:

Will the Minister of COMMUNICATIONS be pleased to state:

- (a) whether the mobile towers of telecom PSUs the MTNL and the BSNL are not sufficient to cater to the network requirement of the total number of subscribers;
- (b) if so, the details thereof and the action taken by the Government for expansion of their network capacity, PSU-wise;
- (c) whether  many  of  the  towers  installed  by  BSNL  particularly  in  rural  and  hilly areas  are  non-operational  and  some  of  the  towers  have  to  be  removed  which  are found to be violating the installation norms;
- (d) if  so,  the  details  of  non-functional  towers,  and  the  towers  which  have  been removed, State-wise including Himachal Pradesh and U.P.; and
- (e) the  action  taken  by  these  PSUs  to  augment  their  network  capacity  and  to provide  the  required  equipments  and  fund  to  bring  the  non-operational  towers  in operation, PSU-wise?

## ANSWER

## THE MINISTER OF STATE (IC) OF THE MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS & MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS (SHRI MANOJ SINHA)

- (a) Bharat  Sanchar  Nigam  Limited  (BSNL)  and  Mahanagar  Telephone  Nigam  Limited (MTNL)  are  providing  telecom  services  including  mobile  service  in  their  respective  license service  areas  and  are  meeting  benchmarks  of  most  of  the  QoS(Quality  of  Service) parameters  prescribed  by  Telecom  Regulatory  Authority  of  India  (TRAI).    The  capacity  of mobile network is sufficient to service the subscriber base.
- (b) State/Circle wise status as on 30.9.2016 of working BTSs (Base Transceiver Station) is at Annexure-I.

In  areas  where  there  are  weak  signals  and  network  problems  exist,  to  further enhance capacity of BSNL mobile network, Phase-VII+ project is under rollout. State/Circle wise details of towers planned to be installed by BSNL in this project is given at Annexure-II.

MTNL  is  expanding/upgrading  its  3G  network  in  Delhi  and  Mumbai  as  detailed below:

- I.  Expansion of GSM / 3G RF network in Delhi: MTNL is in the process of expansion of mobile network by adding 1080 number of 3G sites for higher Data handling capacity. Purchase order of Rs 295 Cr. has been placed on 18.06.2016 for adding 1080 number of 3G sites in Delhi.
- II.  3G  Network  Up-Gradation  in  Mumbai: MTNL  has  also  planned  to upgrade  the  existing  3G  network  in  Mumbai  to  make  it  a  high  speed network  of  'HSPA+  version'.  Purchase  Order  of  Rs  28  Cr  has  been placed.  After  the  proposed  up-gradation,  the  customers  will  get  a downlink  speed  of  21.1  Mbps  &  uplink  speed  of  5.76  Mbps  which  is presently  of  3.6  Mbps  &  384  Kbps  respectively.    Project  is  under advanced stage of implementation.
3. (c) As per information received from BSNL, it is not violating any norms during installation of mobile towers.  As on 30.11.2016, a total of 697 towers are non-operational in the country due to various reasons.
4. (d) No tower has been removed by BSNL due to violation of installation norms including in  Himachal  Pradesh  and  Uttar  Pradesh.    However,  13  towers  are  non-operational  in Himachal Pradesh due to non-availability of power supply from the State Electricity Board.
5. (e) The action taken to augment network capacity is as detailed in (b) above.  The towers are  non-operational  not  due  to  equipment  and  faults  but  largely  due  to  techno-commercial reasons.

Contd…3/-

Annexure-I State/Circle wise details of BTS working

| S.No   | Name of Circle       | No. of working 2G BTS   | No. of working 3G Node B   |
|--------|----------------------|-------------------------|----------------------------|
| A      | BSNL                 |                         |                            |
| 1      | ANDHRA PRADESH       | 7655                    | 3645                       |
| 2      | ANDMAN & NICOBAR     | 152                     | 43                         |
| 3      | ASSAM                | 1433                    | 869                        |
| 4      | BIHAR                | 2950                    | 905                        |
| 5      | CHENNAI TD           | 1872                    | 967                        |
| 6      | CHHATTISGARH         | 1918                    | 518                        |
| 7      | GUJARAT              | 4643                    | 2367                       |
| 8      | HARYANA              | 2172                    | 1203                       |
| 9      | HIMACHAL PRADESH     | 1252                    | 397                        |
| 10     | JAMMU & KASHMIR      | 1189                    | 473                        |
| 11     | JHARKHAND            | 1991                    | 853                        |
| 12     | KARNATAKA            | 5710                    | 2601                       |
| 13     | KERALA               | 5408                    | 2906                       |
| 14     | KOLKATTA TD          | 1276                    | 706                        |
| 15     | MADHYA PRADESH       | 3865                    | 1247                       |
| 16     | MAHARASHTRA          | 7398                    | 2630                       |
| 17     | NORTH EAST I         | 784                     | 349                        |
| 18     | NORTH EAST II        | 752                     | 366                        |
| 19     | ODISHA               | 3225                    | 1438                       |
| 20     | PUNJAB               | 3489                    | 1603                       |
| 21     | RAJASTHAN            | 4245                    | 1565                       |
| 22     | TAMIL NADU           | 5834                    | 2360                       |
| 23     | UTTAR PRADESH (EAST) | 5996                    | 1908                       |
| 24     | UTTAR PRADESH (WEST) | 2837                    | 1361                       |
| 25     | UTTARAKHAND          | 1058                    | 491                        |
| 26     | WEST BENGAL          | 2543                    | 638                        |
|        | TOTAL BSNL:          | 81647                   | 34409                      |
| B      | MTNL:                |                         |                            |
| 1      | DELHI                | 1114                    | 749                        |
| 2      | MUMBAI               | 983                     | 690                        |
|        | TOTAL MTNL:          | 2097                    | 1439                       |

Contd….4/-

## Planned   BTSs   of Phase VII+ GSM rollout project

| S.N   | Name of Circle      |   3G(NODE Bs) planned in Ph VII+ |   2G BTS Planned in Ph-VII+ |
|-------|---------------------|----------------------------------|-----------------------------|
| 1     | ANADAMAN NICOBAR    |                               60 |                          67 |
| 2     | ANDHRA PRADESH      |                             1460 |                         660 |
| 3     | ASSAM               |                              330 |                         270 |
| 4     | BIHAR               |                              821 |                         821 |
| 5     | CHENNAI TD          |                              371 |                         251 |
| 6     | HARYANA             |                              530 |                         383 |
| 7     | HIMACHAL PRADESH    |                              276 |                         153 |
| 8     | JAMMU & KASHMIR     |                              176 |                         176 |
| 9     | JHARKHAND           |                              185 |                         185 |
| 10    | KARNATAKA           |                             1600 |                         830 |
| 11    | KERALA              |                             1950 |                         638 |
| 12    | KOLKATA             |                             1000 |                        1000 |
| 13    | NORTH EAST-I        |                              227 |                         268 |
| 14    | NORTH EAST-II       |                               59 |                          59 |
| 15    | ODISHA              |                              618 |                         570 |
| 16    | PUNJAB              |                              370 |                         337 |
| 17    | RAJASTHAN           |                              428 |                         428 |
| 18    | TAMILNADU           |                             1461 |                         600 |
| 19    | UTTAR PRADESH(EAST) |                              710 |                         625 |
| 20    | UTTAR PRADESH(WEST) |                              305 |                         330 |
| 21    | UTTARAKHAND         |                              256 |                         154 |
| 22    | WEST BENGAL         |                               75 |                         200 |
|       | Total               |                            13268 |                        9038 |

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## Annexure-II