New BSNL CMD to Focus on Turning State-Run Firm Into Profitable Venture

Soon after taking charge, he also said affordable connectivity is another priority area for which BSNL will work with government.

"Government is focusing on connecting unconnected people with telecom services including high speed broadband. As BSNL CMD it will be my priority area to work with government in connecting people at affordable cost, expeditiously and at turning around BSNL into a profitable venture," Shrivastava told PTI.

Shrivastava was appointed CMD of BSNL for period of five years or till the time of superannuation age of 60 years.

"I will take up important pending project of NOFN, mobile service in Left-wing extremist affected areas, network for spectrum on priority basis, connecting unconnected villages," he added.

He has an uphill task of fast roll-out of National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN), which is one of the major projects of the NDA government.

BSNL is working lay about 1.6 lakh kilometres of optical fibre cable (OFC) in 408 districts covering over 81,000 village panchayats under Phase 1 NOFN . As per sources, the PSU has finished only laying of only 6 percent OFC by end of 2014.

The government is committed to covering 50,000 village panchayats by March 2015, another 1 lakh by March 2016 and rest of 1 lakh by December 2016 under NOFN project.

BSNL's profits started declining continuously from Rs. 10,183 crores in 2004-05 before recording a loss in 2009-10.