BSNL will sell assets worth Rs 18,000 crore, a financial crisis facing the company

- Earned Rs 8,500 crore by issuing bonds

New Delhi on 22nd September 2020 Tuesday

Amid the economic crisis, state-owned BSNL was planning to sell its assets worth Rs 18,000 crore. The central government had given the green signal for the scheme.

BSNL had earlier issued sovereign guarantee bonds in the face of the economic crisis. It earned BSNL Rs 8,500 crore. The government had given leave to issue these bonds to sit BSNL.

"We issued the bonds at 10.30 am and closed at 12 noon," BSNL chairman PK Purwar said. In such a short time we got twice as much response as expected. We got a bid of Rs 17,170 crore. But we only accepted bids of Rs 8,500 crore. The bonds were issued at 6.79 per cent per annum for ten years.

BSNL's bond scheme was attended by ICICI Prudential Bond, National Pension Scheme, State Bank of India and Punjab National Bank. State Bank of India directly contributed Rs 1,500 crore.

Proof further said that BSNL had applied for Five G testing. BSNL will decide the partner based on the norms set by the government. BSNL had already collaborated with Chinese company ZTE for this. The company has so far provided 44 per cent of the mobile network equipment to BSNL.