Minister of State for Communications and Rural Development, Dr Pemmasani Chandra Sekhar, in a written reply to question in the Lok Sabha today said that with a view to strengthen BSNL and to make it robust, competitive and viable, Government has approved three revival packages to BSNL amounting to approx. Rs. 3.22 Lakh crores. These packages cover capital infusion, debt restructuring, viability gap funding for rural telephony, and the provision of 4G/5G spectrum, among other measures.

The Government has administratively assigned spectrum to BSNL in frequency bands of 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz, 2500 MHz and 3300 MHz at auction-determined prices for providing 4G and 5G services.

As a result of the revival packages given to BSNL, BSNL has started earning operating profits from F.Y. 2020-21.

BSNL has added 13,748 number of 2G BTS, 39,722 number of 3G BTS (NodeB) and 1,03,305 number of 4G BTS (eNodeB) since 2014.

To strengthening the telecom services, BSNL is rolling out one lakh indigenously developed 4G sites for pan India deployment. As on 28.02.2026, total 97,906 4G sites have been installed and 96,103 4G sites are ON-Air.            

Further, Amended Bharatnet program has been approved by the Union Cabinet on 04.08.2023 with an outlay of Rs. 1.39 Lakh Crores to extend fiber to all Gram Panchayats and villages on demand basis, including provisions for 1.5 Crores high speed FTTH broadband connections in rural areas. BSNL is the Project Management Agency for this scheme.

To further expand the network coverage in Border and remote areas, the Government is implementing various schemes such as 4G Saturation Scheme, Border Out Post (BOP)/Border Intelligence Post (BIP) etc. The details of these schemes are available on https://usof.gov.in.

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MI/ARJ

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