The past couple of days have seen BSNL in the news with announcements of various offers targeted towards different segments. The telecom major also announced plans of foray in new services like Wimax.

To start with the PSU has launched a scheme for foreign visitors. The scheme to be launched in Kerala soon, will offer special pre-paid SIM for foreign tourists with a sale value of Rs. 5618 and talk value of Rs 3000.This was disclosed by BSNL'''s CGM for Kerala, K S Sreenivasan. The scheme's call charges will be the same as that of pre-paid general and its validity would be for 30 days.

Some of the additional services introduced by BSNL recently include Resource Tracking and Management Service (RTMS), which will enable enterprises in transport sector to track, monitor, and manage fleets with a simple web browser that would show the "tracked resource" on a computer. A similar service for ordinary consumers called "people finder" was also on the cards, said Mr. Sreenivasan.

BSNL Kerala also introduced channel-based electronic recharge facility — C-Topup — in Pathanamthitta Secondary Switching Area (SSA). Recharges ranging from Rs.10 to Rs.10,000 can be done through this facility, BSNL General Manager, C. Sasidharan said.

Mr. Sasidharan said the C-Topup service will be available to the customers through various franchises of BSNL in the district. He said the new scheme will address the complaints regarding recharge coupons. BSNL has also decided to renovate public booths in the SSA as BSNL agencies. Select agencies will be converted into One Stop Shops where customers can get new landline connections, Wireless in Local Loop(WLL) connections, broadband connections, mobile post-paid connections, recharge coupons, India telephone cards, etc.

The BSNL GM said that all applications for land phone connection in the district will be cleared by December. He said BSNL has identified 35 new sites for setting up Base Transmission Stations (BTS) in the district and optical fibre cable laying work was progressing at all these sites.

In another development, the Minister of State for Communications Shakeel Ahmad announced that BSNL will add 11 lakh new mobile connections in the next fiscal at accost of Rs.400 crore.

Meanwhile BSNL GM Tirupati Telecom District, S Balachandran announced that BSNL will launch services like ‘Movie on Demand’ and ‘IP TV’ soon.

BSNL also announced that it will no longer offer stand-alone landlines. The PSU has decided to offer a bundled broadband connection with every new landline that it installs across the country. Customers will not be charged extra for these broadband activated landlines.

According to a senior executive, te users can activate the high-speed internet connection at any time. The move is in line with BSNL’s plans to increase its broadband users base. “This will be extended to the landlines being installed even in rural areas – 99.9% of all new landlines will come with this facility,” the executive added.

In the next round, the PSU will make all its existing landline connections internet enabled. “The process is expected to be completed by the month-end, after which any landline subscriber of BSNL can log on to the internet without taking a Sancharnet connection and thereby avoiding the hassle of registration or taking a separate subscription package for the internet. However, the speeds here will be that of dial-up connection – at 56 Mbps – and not at 256 Mbps as provided through a broadband connection, “the BSNL executive said.

BSNL also feels broadband-enabled fixedline connections will help revive the falling subscriber base in the wireline segment. Trai’s latest report states that the PSUs’ wireline base is decreasing and after a 2.46% decline in the April–June quarter, BSNL had 33.58 million wireline subscribers as of April-end, 2007. BSNL is also set to launch IPTV services in all major cities and is confident that its broadband base will witness a significant increase on offering this service.