Still Waiting For The Beep

IT was, to say the least, a sweet gesture. Much like an airline regretting a delayed departure with a small box of chocolates to each passenger, mobile telephone service provider Escotel sent cakes to each of its estimated 4,000 subscribers in Kerala during the week preceding Christmas. The reason: the nearly two-month delay in providing any kind of mobile phone services in three of the five centres in the state. For the two other centres, Escotel had not been able to link mobile phones to land lines even two months after mobile to mobile services were made operational.

And the reasons for the endless beep tones seeking connectivity: an overbearing Department of Telecom (DOT) that works at a snail's pace and holds up clearances, aided by agitating unions opposing the entry of private operators into telecom services in the Left Front-ruled state.

Escotel, a joint venture of Escorts and First Pacific of Hong Kong, and BPL-US West Cellular Ltd, received licences to provide cellular services for the Kerala circle in end- 1995. And in early November, Escotel 'launched' its services in two centres, Kochy and Kozhikode, where an estimated 2,000 subscribers are able to make calls from their cellular phones only to another cellular phone. But not to DOT's public switch telephone network (PSTN), simply known as land lines. Elsewhere in Thiru-vananthapuram, Kottayam and Thrissoor, Escotel has only thrown open bookings for the service which was originally scheduled for launch along with Kochy and Kozhikode. Things have moved even slower at BPL-US West. Despite bookings being open in Kochy, Thiruvananthap-uram, Thrissoor and Kozhikode for nearly two months now—Kochy alone accounting for an estimated 2,000 bookings—subscribers are yet to receive their handsets.

The delays were triggered as early as in July 1995 when technicians of BPL-US West entered a DOT exchange at Palarivattom in Ernakulam to instal their equipment. Enraged that a private operator was  allowed to use a DOT facility, telecom employees prevented the BPL technicians from installing their equipment. Similarly in October last, Escotel technicians were prevented from installing their equipment at the Panampilly Nagar exchange in Ernakulam. Though affiliated to various trade unions, the employees formed a Joint Action Council of Telecom Employees and staged dharnas as part of the agitation to stall the private service providers from achieving any progress.

If that wasn't cause enough for the service providers to wait for a dial tone with bated breath and thousands of crores in investment, the DOT assumed its legendary multi-avatar role of being a service provider for the cellular network, a regulator, inspector and technology assistor, with elan. With clearances from Sanchar Bha-wan, Delhi, held up, the Kerala circle of DOT was unable to keep pace with the service providers, especially Escotel, in establishing the cellular network and getting it operational. And the most vital delay was in providing interconnectivity—access for cellular phones to call land phones and vice-versa. A delay that has not yet enabled subscribers to go mobile in the true sense of the word and resulting in zero revenue for two months for Escotel, a loss the company is yet to tabulate.

"We have been ready with our network since November but the DOT has not been able to keep pace," laments V.G. Somasekhar, deputy general manager, Escotel, who is in charge of the company's Kerala operations. "Though there are no live issues contributing to the delay from the DOT's side, interconnectivity has got held up. The DOT does not seem to be clear about the logistics of the operations and we have ended up waiting for interconnectivity," he adds. Escotel and BPL are understandably apprehensive of ruffling any DOT feathers that could lead to further delays in their operations. As a result, Somasekhar and his BPL-US West counterpart, Finance Director K.S Jayanth Kumar, are cagey about the nature of their problems with DOT. "There are a number of issues that need to be tackled to launch our services. With the cooperation of the local DOT, we are confident of resolving and overcoming these problems," is all Kumar, whose company has set apart Rs 1,200 crore as investment for the Kerala circle over a 10-year period, has to say.

PRIVATELY though, other senior Escotel and BPL-US West managers list the agony of dealing with the DOT and the agitating unions. "The delays were less technical and more at the policy level," says a senior Escotel manager who wished to remain unnamed. "In fact, the technicalities of setting up the network and gearing up for interconnectivity were the least of the problems we faced. It was the policy level direction of the DOT that did not support the technical progress." Adds a senior BPL-US West manager: "BPL faced some delays in other circles where it had bid for cellular licences. But the problem in Kerala was accentuated as progress is slow due to the strong unions and a DOT management that is scared to move." And the delays occur at various levels. When service providers planned to instal their equipment, the DOT raised endless questions of how the equipment would be maintained though maintenance was not a question DOT could go into.

"In every area that needed a DOT inspection or clearance, there were delays," complains the harried Escotel manager. "It could be due to the systems, processes and logistics that are built into the department's functioning, or it could be due to DOT, Delhi, not giving sufficient clearance authority to the various circles. And when the clearances came, the Kerala DOT has been slow to implement the clearances." He points out that the DOT has a stranglehold over every activity of the cellular service provider starting from approving even the intra-cellular network, providing interconnectivity, collecting licence fees for the second year and allowing its facilities to be used for installing the network.

A stranglehold that was converted into ammunition by the telecom employees' unions that have been opposed to the entry of private operators into telecom services. "Our agitation is against the privatisation of telecom services in the country and the Telecom Policy of 1994 which allowed private companies to operate value-added services and also talked of giving them access to basic services," says P.V. Chandrasekharan, convener of the Telecom Protection Samithi (TPS), Thiruvananthapuram, an umbrella organisation of all telecom employees' unions and federations in Kerala including some officers' organisations. Chandrasekharan claims that the TPS is not against any private company like Escotel or BPL but is agitating for the primacy of the DOT. Says he: "The DOT is capable of providing cellular services. In fact, we have the infrastructure to provide the services at cheaper rates. All we need is some funding."

While Chandrasekharan assures that there won't be any further obstacles in the path of the mobile service providers as their agitation was only a warning to the Government to be circumspect while privatising telecom services, he cautions that any attempt to allow private operators into basic services would lead to serious disruption of telecom services in the state. And as for the DOT, the delays are brushed aside in typical bureaucratese. "I don't think there was any delay," says S. Krishnan, chief general manager, DOT, Kerala circle. "We have given them (service providers) all clearances though there may have been some normal delays. According to the licence agreement, they were to get interconnectivity within a year of signing the agreement and we have been able to provide interconnectivity before the period ended."

Krishnan points out that there were some grey areas in regard to inspections and who was supposed to do the inspections. Besides, with cellular services being new to the country and interconnection of two networks being done for the first time, it needed patience. "Since the service providers were also new to the business, they too were inexperienced," he explains. Yet neither he nor Escotel or BPL-US West are able to set a deadline for the 'real launch' of mobile services. "Ask them (service providers)," replies Krishnan about when the Keralite would truly go mobile. "Ask the DOT. It's anybody's guess," says Somasekhar. And as always, it is the subscriber suffering due to crossed wires.