Surat: Employees of the Surat Circle of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) took out a rally to press for their long-pending demands on Thursday.The rally was organised on the part of the nation-wide call given by the BNSL employees union on the issues relating to the strengthening of BNSL against the fierce competition by the private telecom players in the country.The BNSL employees submitted a memorandum to the district collector Mahendra Patel with a slew of demands on Thursday.The BNSL employees said that the healthy and vibrant BSNL as 100% government owned undertaking is must in the interest of the nation as well as the customers for preventing the private telecom operators from fleecing them by forming a cartel and imposing monopolistic tariffs.The employees strongly opposed the PMO's letter dated December 30, 2016, to the secretary of the Department of Telecommunication, hinting for necessary process of the NITI Ayog's recommendation on disinvestment of BNSL.A strong demand has been made for the formation of subsidiary tower company, by separating all its towers from BNSL.The employees alleged that the BSNL was allotted non-standard Broadband Wireless Access (BWA ) spectrum—4G compatible spectrum — and a huge amount was collected for it.The BNSL has surrendered this spectrum in six major circles and other circles also due to the non-standard spectrum.BSNL's employee union leader, Gani Patel said, "It is our strong recommendation to the Government of India to stop undue concessions extended to Reliance Jio. We strongly demand that a standard quality 4G spectrum should be provided to the BNSL to compete with the private telecom players in the market."

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