BSNL to release February salaries of its employees today, says CMD Anupam Shrivastava

Public sector telecom company BSNL will give February's salaries of its employees today, said Anupam Shrivastava, Chief Managing Director (CMD). "BSNL will pay salary of all employees by tomorrow. We are thankful to telecom minister Manoj Sinha for his timely intervention to ensure that salaries of employees are paid at the earliest", the BSNL CMD said.

The Telecom Firm added the revenue receipt in the month of March was usually higher as this was the time when internal accruals started flowing in.

"We expect total accruals of Rs 2,700 crore in March of which Rs 850 crore will be used for salary disbursement", Shrivastava said.

The major reason behind higher accruals is the addition of new subscribers. Apparently, Reliance Jio is another company that has higher accruals apart from BSNL.

"Minister took lead and directly monitored situation to resolve the crisis. I am also thankful to BSNL employees who ensured that the services are running", Shrivastava said.

He said that DoT helped BSNL with Presidential Sanction to meet working capital of the company and a letter of comfort for the same was issued to the company on Wednesday.

"We will serve letter of comfort to bank tomorrow following which they will start processing amount of Rs 3,500 crore to working capital requirement of BSNL", Shrivastava said.

He said that with the support of DoT, there will not be further delay in salary disbursement in the coming months.

Apparently, Telecom firms MTNL and BSNL failed to pay salaries to their employees for the month of February, according to employees'representatives.

An official had told PTI on Wednesday that the DOT had released pending dues of Rs 171 crore to cash-strapped MTNL for paying February salaries to employees.

BSNL has 1.76 lakh employees across India and MTNL has around 22,000. It is estimated that 16,000 MTNL employees and 50 per cent of BSNL employees will retire in the next 5-6 years.

(With agency inputs: PTI)

 Also read: BSNL, MTNL to clear February salaries of employees as govt releases pending dues

Also read: From declining revenues to increasing debt: How BSNL lost its stature as 'Navratna' PSU