Trai raps BSNL over network congestion

Private cellular operators are facing an "extremely high-level of congestion" on Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd's (BSNL) network, resulting in causing serious inconvenience to mobile subscribers.

According to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), the congestion, which at certain places was at "alarming" degrees, was owing to a delay in provisioning of E1 circuits.

"The degree of congestion at many places is alarming. As on April 2006, the degree of congestion in 404 point of interconnect (PoI) was greater than 5 per cent, in 264 PoIs the degree of congestion was more than 10 per cent and in 101 PoIs it was over 40 per cent," TRAI secretary Rajendra Singh said in a letter to BSNL chairman and managing director A K Sinha.

According to the letter, a copy of which is in possession of Business Standard, the degree of congestion at some places was over 90 per cent and was greater than 100 per cent in eight places during peak hours. Most of the PoIs facing congestion were with BSNL.