New Delhi: The Centre will infuse ₹33,757 crore in state-run telecom operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), according to the Union Budget for 2025-25. This capital infusion is down 53% from ₹72,027 crore in the revised final allocation for FY25.
The company is expected to start generating strong annual growth in revenue, after a turnaround plan saw BSNL execute a ₹15,000 crore 4G deployment contract.
The deployment phase is nearly complete, with BSNL 4G services expected to come online by the end of this fiscal. The Centre had allocated ₹56,785 crore for BSNL’s turnaround in FY24, before ramping it up to ₹82,916 crore in initial allocation for FY25.
BSNL had for long struggled to keep pace with competing private, domestic telecom operators, namely Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio. As part of its turnaround plan, the Centre had liquidated the stagnant assets of the operator before introducing 4G services to the operator. Last year, BSNL’s 4G tariff was announced as lower than its private competitors, who have rolled out 5G services since 2022.
Since June, its moves to set up its own 4G network has largely paid off. Subscriber reports by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) as of 22 January said that the operator added a net of 6.5 million users to its network, including a decline of 340,000 users in November last year after four straight months of sequential growth.
Industry stakeholders said that the Centre’s reduction of capital outlay to cater to BSNL is a clear signifier of increasing operational autonomy of the operator.
“The government continued to provide need-based financial support to telecom public sector undertaking (PSU) units, with FY25’s revised expenditure being just 7% lower than the original budgetary outlay,” Prashant Tarwadi, director at market intelligence firm India Ratings & Research, said.
“A lower allocation in FY26 budgetary expenditure for BSNL implies that support from the government would increasingly be need-based, rather than automatic—and focused on improving the structural competitiveness and efficiencies (of the organization),” he added.
