Goa, May 30, 2020

During the lockdown period telephone and internet services have become the umbilical cords for the citizens to the outside world. Demand for online services both for professional and entertainment needs skyrocketed during the lock down period. Bharat Sanchar Nigam limited; Goa has yet again fulfilled its role as the data backbone for the state of Goa.

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, a Govt of India Enterprise with its Goa Headquarters at Patto Panaji is running and maintaining an exhaustive telecom network of 144 Telephone Exchanges, Eleven customer service centres, Mobile Base Transceiver Stations etc.  Optical Fibre/Underground cable network of BSNL is spread across the nook & corner of Goa State providing a bouquet of services of Landline Telephony, Broadband Internet, Leased/data services, Fibre To The Home (FTTH), Mobile services etc, catering to all sections of society. The following are some of the initiatives taken by BSNL Goa during Covid-19 lock-down in Goa State. 

• Special Helplines are provided to the Offices of Collector North & South Goa.
  • Food Helplines:  9423890077 (North Goa) 9423890066 (South Goa)
  • Disaster Management:  9423702575 (North Goa) 9423702675 (South Goa)
• BSNL being the life-line of Goa State and the entire banking sector is operational on BSNL telecom network, necessary steps have been taken to ensure efficiency of network provided to banking sector.
• BSNL offices and customer service centres were made fully operational to facilitate general public in dealing with all types of issues, so as to cause least inconvenience to the customers.

Optical fibre cable restoration at Panchwadi

• Round-the-clock monitoring and maintaining essential telecom services provided to the Raj Bhavan, Chief Minister Office, Collectorate, Police Headquarters and Stations, Hospitals, Public Work Department, Electricity Department, Water supply Dept etc facilitated in smooth conduct of the State Government functions.
• Round-the-clock maintenance team’s set-up to deal with any type of break-down/other issues to avoid any disruption in services. The faults were attended even in very difficult conditions to ensure efficiency of telecom services.            
• In order to ease the Work from Home model, the BSNL launched the plan Work@Home plan which gives Free internet to BSNL broadband users and offers 5GB daily data with speed up to 10Mbps for one month from activation date.  This plan is provided free-of-cost and applicable for new and old BSNL customers. No additional cost for installation or security fees is required.
• To support businesses, BSNL Cloud based Video Conferencing Solution is being offered free-of-cost to BSNL Enterprise and Retail Customers across India to stay engaged with their employees. Other plans such as Bharat Fiber Broadband, Bharat Fibre broadband bundled with Hotstar to cater to the entertainment needs also was launched BSNL during the COVID19 Pandemic. To facilitate customers especially the senior citizens who constitute 17% of the total population in Goa, grace period granted i.e the last date for bill payments has been extended to facilitate all sections of society. BSNL offices and customer service centres were made fully operational to facilitate general public in dealing with all types of issues, so as to cause least inconvenience to the esteemed customers. The broadband and mobile data consumption increased a whopping 31 % and 24% respectively during this lockdown period.
• As per the guidelines of State & Central Governments all precautionary steps to prevent Covid-19, like the use of sanitizers, mask, cleanliness in all BSNL offices were initiated.  The staff have been made well-conversed with the challenges in dealing with the customers while maintaining social distancing norms. Even with the challenges in movement of men & material due to limited transport facilities, all the BSNL offices were made fully functional from day-1 of the lockdown period i.e  from 25-03-2020 till date. BSNL has been working in close coordination with all the State, Central Govt departments and other agencies in the day-to-day functioning during the lock-down period.

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