Indian Telecom Folder

[jamwal]

In 1999 long distance calls

You are talking about J&K. Let me tell you situation in PUNE. [:)]

My close friend went into BSNL's divisional Office, Pune for his broadband connection. He filled the form and provided all the documents. Now, they asked him to present Original Rent agreement as address proof since he was living in a rented apartment. But, he rightly said that he has the Xerox copy of Notarized Rent agreement and his original PASSPORT on his name as well as original light bill(issued by State electricity board) showing the address.

That BSNL guy replied him like this - "You know what, do you know? There were bomb blasts. Now situation is strict. We have to answer Government. If one doesn't have proper documents, we can't issue a connection. Its dangerous. Go there. See on that wall,.. whats there.. See that! Its written there, that you need to show documents."


Now, you can see the situation is same all around India. Such stupid a$$holes are not only in Government but in BSNL also.

I know BSNL first hand. Worked for a while on their broadband project. New generation of employees is mostly fine and sincere, but oldies always undo any good work done by the rest. Too much babus spoiling things
One guy used to say this often, "BSNL is a private company now, but these people here still treat it like a govt. job. No accountability, no responsibility. Only stupid decisions."
Private firms are a bit better only because people in sales have pressure to perform. These guys will twist any rule to keepup sales. Even selling connections to people who have history of defaulting on their previous connections.


By the way, have you been using Orkut lately?

[Sachin]

Private firms are a bit better only because people in sales have pressure to perform. These guys will twist any rule to keepup sales.

I have observed one thing in Bangalore. Calls to BSNL mobile phones are not going through (when calling from the private cell phone services). "I am sorry, this is an invalid number" seems to be their favourite message. And the same number (BSNL one) can be reached from a calling booth, a normal land line and from another BSNL mobile. Don't know the technicalities, but I get a feeling that this is another shady practise employeed by the private service providers.

[bart]

According to many people in the know, BSNL is severely hit by corruption. For example:
-When Reliance hit the market, they hired many of BSNL's top people. Nothing wrong with that but it was not normal hiring, instead it was designed to put BSNL out of action - most of the management were hired for 25-30 L packages and were paid just to sit around doing nothing, i.e it was less to use them in Reliance than to disrupt BSNL.
-Unions are paid to keep the lower rung staff protesting and opposed to any expansion or increase in efficiency.
-BSNL management and babus have been paid off to keep from improving or fixing quality problems or increasing capacity. Due to that we have had several large orders for expansion botched under some flimsy pretext or another.
-Due to corruption we also had the ridiculous situation of BSNL SIM cards being rationed and people having to be on a waiting list just to get it, while private operators were selling them over the counter. At that point of time BSNL was the only network to have wide coverage to rural areas which was a huge asset to them, and that has allowed Bharti and Reliance to catch up. Also in everything ranging from copper to every street for DSL connections, to landlines, to national network connectivity, connectivity to rural areas, fiber to GSM base stations etc, BSNL being the incumbent provider had infrastructure that was way ahead of the rest about 6 years back, but they have totally allowed all that to be wasted and private players are now ahead on most counts.

[svinayak]

According to many people in the know, BSNL is severely hit by corruption. For example:
-When Reliance hit the market, they hired many of BSNL's top people. Nothing wrong with that but it was not normal hiring, instead it was designed to put BSNL out of action - most of the management were hired for 25-30 L packages and were paid just to sit around doing nothing, i.e it was less to use them in Reliance than to disrupt BSNL.
-Unions are paid to keep the lower rung staff protesting and opposed to any expansion or increase in efficiency.
-BSNL management and babus have been paid off to keep from improving or fixing quality problems or increasing capacity. Due to that we have had several large orders for expansion botched under some flimsy pretext or another.
-Due to corruption we also had the ridiculous situation of BSNL SIM cards being rationed and people having to be on a waiting list just to get it, while private operators were selling them over the counter. At that point of time BSNL was the only network to have wide coverage to rural areas which was a huge asset to them, and that has allowed Bharti and Reliance to catch up. Also in everything ranging from copper to every street for DSL connections, to landlines, to national network connectivity, connectivity to rural areas, fiber to GSM base stations etc, BSNL being the incumbent provider had infrastructure that was way ahead of the rest about 6 years back, but they have totally allowed all that to be wasted and private players are now ahead on most counts.

Somebody close in my family told lot of things was happening.

Rel and Airtel employed BSNL employees to give them maps of all the lines and network of the ITI/BSNL and govt org.
Rel leveraged this info to expand rapidly

[Singha]

thats assuming govt agencies know where all their cables are. the truth is over decades
this information is lost and exploratory digs are carried out to find which agencies
exist below ground. there is no concept of cemented ducts in India where all
utilities can run through

for bengaluru metro they did this and found long lost cables....

[Dileep]

You guys are asking too much from BSNL I say.

I got my first landline in 1996. One had to go to the city office of DoT, stand in queue, give the application and the DD for deposit, and wait three years to get the connection. Then you have to bribe the AE, JE, JTO and lineman to get it "provided".

That one was surrendered when we moved massa.

I got the second one a couple of days ago (had Cell and Tata Wireless till now). Just walked in into the service centre locally here, filled up the application, gave a xerox of the passport. Within a week the connection came. ORders of magnitude better!!!

[BhairavP]

BSNL have good, fast unlimited broadband plans out in the non-metros. Stupid leeches at MTNL are still offering 256k unlimited in Bombay @ 2500 per month. No thanks!

[Dileep]

I am totally pissed off on VSNL(Oops, Tata Indicom) DSL service.

It used to work "kind of OK" till last month. Every couple of weeks it will go down. The modem link will show up, but can't ping the gateway. The gateway itself is up, as shown by ping from internet side. Something wrong in the internal network onlee.

There is a local support number. You call that, it it goes to the main call centre somewhere MH I guess. You spend 10 minuted with a stoopid call centre rep going through a checklist, only to hear that a complaint is registered. You can send an e-mail to the custservice id. Sometimes they call with the same stoopid checklist. Sometimes they register the complaint directly.

In any case, the issue used to get resolved in a few hours. Sometimes someone from local VSNL will call you and confirm that it is fixed. But there is NO WAY you can get back to them if you later find that it is still down. The Caller ID is not real, and they will NEVER give out a number to call.

But recently each downtime extends to a few days, and they go through the same process.

So, I decided to go for a BSNL connection. With them, at least you have local support numbers, and you can go to the exchange and YELL at the SDE.

[Raj Malhotra]

MTNL broadband complaint response it much better in Delhi. A email written at 2 in night will have a response in morning with the lineman showing up at your door and then atleast 3-4 calls to confirm that everything is working fine.

[niran]

MTNL broadband complaint response it much better in Delhi. A email written at 2 in night will have a response in morning with the lineman showing up at your door and then atleast 3-4 calls to confirm that everything is working fine.

You must be some high affsar or some neta or someun very high up.
once we had some teknikal problems, it took MTNL 45 days, that too
after parting with one Ghandhiji to repair. the repair took onlee 3 min.
to top it, we got a bill with 1034 ISD calls, all during the time we were
without any landline connection whatsoever.

[Suppiah]

Private firms are a bit better only because people in sales have pressure to perform. These guys will twist any rule to keepup sales.

I have observed one thing in Bangalore. Calls to BSNL mobile phones are not going through (when calling from the private cell phone services). "I am sorry, this is an invalid number" seems to be their favourite message. And the same number (BSNL one) can be reached from a calling booth, a normal land line and from another BSNL mobile. Don't know the technicalities, but I get a feeling that this is another shady practise employeed by the private service providers.

I would be skeptical with such conspiracy theories. Most callers do not know which company the other party is subscribing to. All they know is their own provider is not connecting calls properly. They will call up their hotline, curse and waste bandwidth. Which means the private provider is shooting themselves on their foot, something unlikely. It is more likely there are some other issues. In any case the retaliation capacity of BSNL, being the incumbent provider is much higher as many calls start or end up in their fixed line networks.

BSNL is changing, slowly. Instead of treating the customers as unnecessary nuisance that distracts from their discussing cricket scores, progress of socialism, DA calculations, etc., they now treat them as necessary evil to be dealt with as a consequence of their bad karma of previous birth. If you read their union websites, you will see how they still think by some miracle they can reverse all the progress in telecom sector and go back to the good old days, mostly by using national security as bogey.

I doubt if private providers need to pay anyone to keep BSNL incompetent. I think they do a pretty good job without having to pay for it.

[Suppiah]

BSNL has been surviving using two revenue sources - one is revenue from fixed line networks that are pathetically low if you consider investments required to replace them afresh. This is why Airtel et al have gone terribly slow on their fixed line plans, focusing on big cities that too central areas. BSNL has no such worries because it was given to them free by taxpayers for decades. As anyone that has applied for new landline in suburbs of most Indian cities can testify, unless there are lines already there (most places have spare lines because of surrenders), BSNL will either flatly refuse connections, force customer to take WLL connections or take months to lay cable, even if nearest point is just few dozen meters away. This is not an issue in old suburbs or big cities with established streets/layouts. But fast expanding Tier II/III cities face this issue. That brings us to the next one - the dole that ensures sit and f.rt rights of BSNL parasites.

The dole paid out by private providers in the name of 'rural connectivity'. Mind you this is for landlines, not for cellular which everyone invests in. Wonder how it is actually being used. This open ended akshaya patra (which kept tariffs high in India for years) has been cut down over years and this reflects in the concerns expressed by BSNL parasites in their websites. They keep demanding some ridiculous sum (Rs.40k crore or was it Rs.70000 crore) as 'compensation' for laying cables since independence, because every hour of honest work done is hurting them bad as they are not used to it.

The way to cook this goose properly is for GOI to spin off all cables particularly last mile ones, laid before year 2000 or so (or a year when plan/budget funds were stopped to DOT), to a 'Telecom Infra Corporation of India' wholly owned by GOI, and lease it out to anyone that pays rentals (including BSNL) and use that money to expand it. We dont have NHAI running buses or demanding monopoly driving rights on the roads they lay. BSNL can be paid $1 as compensation for it. This will ensure broadband and fixed line penetration like you have never seen before. Right now these are at pathetic levels, as Ministry of Telcom babus have time and again mentioned.

Does anyone expect any Govt, be it UPA or NDA to be led by concerns of the overall economy versus the milking rights of a few thousand parasites simply because they are better organised? Not me.

[Rahul M]

well I'm damn satisfied with my BSNL broadband. consistent high speed, very prompt corrective action, usually within the hour during office time.
and best of all the pricing is neat. unlimited at 750/- p.m +taxes is better than anything else out there.

[Suppiah]

well I'm damn satisfied with my BSNL broadband. consistent high speed, very prompt corrective action, usually within the hour during office time.
and best of all the pricing is neat. unlimited at 750/- p.m +taxes is better than anything else out there.

IIRC Rs.750 gets you 256k connection. High time that is not considered broadband. As it is it just about meets TRAI's own definition of 'broadband'. It is quite low by any international standards.

I think if 3G and 3.5G comes sometime next year, cellular co's (incl. BSNL) can give much better speed using mobile data cards/dongles, as it is in Middle East/SE Asia and elsewhere. And at lower costs. Which probably explains the lack of enthusiasm on the part of Airtel / Reliance in providing landline on wider areas.

[Suppiah]

An example of the change in mindset and also you can see quite a bit of evidence of conspiracy theory mindsets.

http://www.bsnleuchq.com/Improvement%20 ... ervice.pdf

[Rahul M]

well I'm damn satisfied with my BSNL broadband. consistent high speed, very prompt corrective action, usually within the hour during office time.
and best of all the pricing is neat. unlimited at 750/- p.m +taxes is better than anything else out there.

IIRC Rs.750 gets you 256k connection. High time that is not considered broadband. As it is it just about meets TRAI's own definition of 'broadband'. It is quite low by any international standards.

I think if 3G and 3.5G comes sometime next year, cellular co's (incl. BSNL) can give much better speed using mobile data cards/dongles, as it is in Middle East/SE Asia and elsewhere. And at lower costs. Which probably explains the lack of enthusiasm on the part of Airtel / Reliance in providing landline on wider areas.

very true. but from what I gather from my friends using tata or sify it is the most cost-effective if you already have a landline.
personally, for domestic use 256kbps does quite OK.

[Suppiah]

For what it provides, BSNL broadband is good because for most of them using it, it is the only option. In big cities/some parts you do have Airtel/Reliance/Tata etc. but not elsewhere. If you see posts in broadband specific forums (like vinuthomas), where available, Airtel seems to match in price/quality/quantity and seems more popular. Hathaway cable is making inroads in some areas.

Our yindoo mindset of being happy with what is given to us (that prompts us to say '256k is good enough for emails and casual browsing, who needs 11MBps?) and blame the rest on fate also is a nice excuse for inaction. Knowing the kind of floor/roof BSNL sets, in terms of quality/quantity, private players are not bothered as long as they are an inch or so ahead.

If you see the PDF file link I posted (union website), you will see the failure in terms of broadband penetration, even as admitted by BSNL TUs to whom all this was bourgeoise luxuries/waste of times a few years ago. The nation is paying a price for it. It is hard to calculate how much, but these things show up years later when some other country that was behind us takes a forward march, as Singapore, South Korea and many many others did over decades and Philipines and others are threatening to do as we speak.

The big issue is the level of investment required in replicating last mile link and the low returns such investment brings. So the private players are sitting quiet, letting technology (WIMAX, 3.5G) provide an answer in its own sweet time. And BSNL upgrades its plans every other year or so, cutting price by a few rupees (it was 900, now 750) making glacial progress towards overall penetration rates that are decent.

[merlin]

BSNL have good, fast unlimited broadband plans out in the non-metros. Stupid leeches at MTNL are still offering 256k unlimited in Bombay @ 2500 per month. No thanks!

Nope. As Rahul M mentioned above its not fast, just 256 kbps. Its unlimited though and price recently dropped from 900 to 750.

[Avinash R]

{The definition of broadband according to the new Broadband policy of the Indian Government, is a service capable of "minimum download speeds of 256Kbps".}
This is from an editorial in digit mag.

Worldwide how is the "real" broadband defined as then?

[Singha]

OECD > 256 kbps
US FCC > 768 kbps

in reality US DSL rates were 1-2 Mbps downstream even a decade ago
and most areas would surely be 5-9 mbps downstream today...alcatel
and others had ADSL modems for 9mbps dnstream even back in that era.

in more tfta bband regions like korea or japan that would be
laughed at...100mbps ethernet to each home or apt seems to be
common there and a fiber (perhaps gigabit eth) drop to each house
or apt. on top of that they have 3G and are first adopters of the
latest wireless stds.

only a tech that can penetrate walls from wimax ranges can save
India and wimax is not it - need a roof antenna to work.
maybe 3+G tech purely as a data access can be it? around 7-14 mbps
is there today and 45 mbps soon.

bsnl seems to have launched ev-do (one variant of 3g) as a data
access service in pilot phase.
http://www.bsnlevdo.in/

3G spectrum auction bids are open in India and sale is supposed to
be done in 1Q2009

for all their chipanda hype, the PRC only got their first 3G service
earlier this year!

[Suppiah]

I doubt if there is a bureaucratic definition of 'broadband' as it is India where everything from what is classical language to what is broadband comes out of a babu's pen.

In any case, in any reasonably advanced country (ignoring TSP types and Africa etc), it should be difficult to procure a 256k connection simply because the lowest available may be much higher! For instance, in Singapore the plans start at 384k even for 3.5G mobile broadband and for wired DSL it is 2mb. In Taiwan, HK, Japan, Korea if you ask for 256k they may send you to the museum.

[Avinash R]

OECD > 256 kbps
US FCC > 768 kbps

thanks singha.
There is an article from bbc about broadband speeds around the world, interestingly the speeds are less than what is advertised by companies.

[Avinash R]

I doubt if there is a bureaucratic definition of 'broadband' as it is India

Well there is actually a definition of broadband by GOI.

Government of India
Ministry of Communications & Information Technology
Department of Telecommunications
BROADBAND POLICY 2004
http://www.dot.gov.in/ntp/broadbandpolicy2004.htm

1.0 Broadband connectivity:
Keeping in view the present status, Broadband connectivity is defined at present as

“An ‘always-on’ data connection that is able to support interactive services including Internet access and has the capability of the minimum download speed of 256 kilo bits per second (kbps) to an individual subscriber from the Point Of Presence (POP) of the service provider intending to provide Broadband service where multiple such individual Broadband connections are aggregated and the subscriber is able to access these interactive services including the Internet through this POP. The interactive services will exclude any services for which a separate licence is specifically required, for example, real-time voice transmission, except to the extent that it is presently permitted under ISP licence with Internet Telephony.”

[Singha]

imho GOI should mandate 750kbps and unlimited download as the minimum standard.

the download caps should be outlawed.

[krishnan]

512 kbps unlimited should be the bare minimum. Also uploads in dataone are slower.

[bart]

While talking about broadband, bandwidth etc, don't forget several important things:

The DSL bandwidth which we are discussing is the last mile, i.e from your house to the service provider pop. After that the speed depends on several important factors:

-International Gateway bandwidth - about 5 years ago this was very expensive and heavily regulated and heavily over subscribed. So even a corporate 2 Mbps connection would perhaps be guaranteed only 256 kbps international. Now the situation is completely different with Tata and Reliance being owners of 2 of the largest international fiber networks and Bharti etc having their own submarine cables as well. So the bandwidth should really be cheaper than abroad but for some reason, while the international bandwidth scenario has significantly improved Indian rates are still higher than many other countries.

-Internet Exchange - Most US tier-1 providers have had this since the 80s, this is basically a high bandwidth inter-connect between various service providers so that there is optimum routing, since due to the nature of the Internet, traffic generated from any service providers customers can go to any other service providers network.For example, if you have a 2 Mb broadband from Bharti, if you are accessing a site hosted on a VSNL network you depend on the IXP between the 2 providers - your speed is going to be only that of the tightest bottleneck. At least, about 7-8 years back the IXPs were non-existent and the interconnect bandwidth was pathetic, like 2 Mbps (I think being the govt monopoly, VSNL was blocking it to prevent competition). There was talk about this some time back, but no idea how much action has been taken on this front.

-Content hosting - Most EU/Jap and almost all US traffic is to domestic hosting locations, so the speeds are faster, delay and re-transmits are less, and the traffic tends to go on high quality links all through. So a person with a 10 Mb broadband can actually get something out of it. Its also important from a national security standpoint. Despite huge hosting centers that have come up in India in recent years, very little of the large sites are hosted out of India. Even popular stuff like Linux/BSD downloads don't have mirrors in India. If I were hosting a small website right now, I think I would still go for a US based hosting company since it would be much cheaper and provide a lot of options. I think the govt should provide incentives to host locally like putting in some national security guidelines for critical sites etc, and also making imports of hardware used in datacenters duty free and tax free to bring the cost in line with international standards. This can actually be an area where we can make inroads into the hosting market as well when combined with increase in international bandwidth.

So unless the above are also taken into account the last mile, whatever it is, while important is a moot point.

[Avinash R]

imho GOI should mandate 750kbps and unlimited download as the minimum standard.

consistently providing 750kbps maybe impossible on the existing copper lines. btw what happend to the ofc that reliance was laying.while the railways is offering speeds upto 155 Mbps on their ofc network, reliance seems to have vanished from the scene.

the download caps should be outlawed.

even british and us broadband providers are introducing d/w caps. too many pirates these days.

[bart]

imho GOI should mandate 750kbps and unlimited download as the minimum standard.

750 maybe impossible on the existing copper lines. btw what happend to the ofc that reliance was laying.

750 kbps is very much possible. US has been offering DSL at 1.5 Mbps for over a decade. In any case most providers in India are offering 2 Mbps already and 8 Mbps is possible over the same cables (and offered by Airtel in Chennai).

One other option for last mile is Wi-Max, and Tata Indicom/Dishnet (who dont have proper underground telephone cables) were heavily banking on it. Also others like reliance and Sify. However the Wi-Max implementations so far in India have turned out to be a total dud, with the quality poor and customers even more unhappy. And Wi-Max as a technology is being written off by a lot of people internationally as not living up to the hype. I think 3.5G with over 1 Mb sustained bandwidth, small antennae, genuine roaming capability, ubiquity that comes with mobile phone ownership etc might be the real solution.

[Avinash R]

Despite huge hosting centers that have come up in India in recent years, very little of the large sites are hosted out of India. Even popular stuff like Linux/BSD downloads don't have mirrors in India.

agree, the nearest mirrors seem to be taiwan and aussieland.

If I were hosting a small website right now, I think I would still go for a US based hosting company since it would be much cheaper and provide a lot of options.

i think it costs atleast $100-150 per month to host a site on a dedicated server in us. the rates may change but here in india manas hosting is providing a Dedicated Server from 4000 upto 6400 per month.

[bart]

the download caps should be outlawed.

even british and us broadband providers are introducing d/w caps. too many pirates these days.

The download caps are rare, and when used tend to be very high, like 100GB per month etc, their purpose is more like a 'fair usage policy' to prevent very unreasonable usage. Its not like here where you have 500 Mb or 1 Gb download caps.

You don't need genuinely download caps. Even if the P2P etc traffic is huge, all you need is QOS to ensure that heavy users don't monopolize the traffic and crowd out lighter users or more critical applications. If the excess bandwidth exists, there is absolutely no problem with letting users use it.

Here we have a situation where the providers have huge excess bandwidth plus dark fiber and still put download caps. This amounts to artificially creating a supply shortage to jack up prices, and as Singha rightly pointed out, the govt needs to step in just like they did to make the definition of broadband as min 256 kbps (earlier 64 kbps DSL was being offered and even the crap reliance handset internet connection was being marketed as broadband!)

[Avinash R]

750 kbps is very much possible. US has been offering DSL at 1.5 Mbps for over a decade.

is speeds of 750kbps constant or are they variable?

In any case most providers in India are offering 2 Mbps already and 8 Mbps is possible over the same cables (and offered by Airtel in Chennai).

the dataone speed is variable and during peak hours it constantly fluctuates.

[Avinash R]

The download caps are rare, and when used tend to be very high, like 100GB per month etc, their purpose is more like a 'fair usage policy' to prevent very unreasonable usage. Its not like here where you have 500 Mb or 1 Gb download caps.

for 750 you get unlimited download, that's just 15.89 us$. i dont think the costs are going to get any lower than that.

[bart]

[quote="bart"

-Internet Exchange - Most US tier-1 providers have had this since the 80s, this is basically a high bandwidth inter-connect between various service providers so that there is optimum routing, since due to the nature of the Internet, traffic generated from any service providers customers can go to any other service providers network.For example, if you have a 2 Mb broadband from Bharti, if you are accessing a site hosted on a VSNL network you depend on the IXP between the 2 providers - your speed is going to be only that of the tightest bottleneck. At least, about 7-8 years back the IXPs were non-existent and the interconnect bandwidth was pathetic, like 2 Mbps (I think being the govt monopoly, VSNL was blocking it to prevent competition). There was talk about this some time back, but no idea how much action has been taken on this front.
[/quote]

Looks like that has been taken care of:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India_Internet_Exchange

[Singha]

without 3G there is no chance of bband penetration improving in India. the pvt providers
are weak financially and BSNL who owns our taxpayer funded copper and fiber is
(a) too big to be allowed to fail
(b) too unionized to be asked to share the infra

BSNL == Pakistan.

if they can price 3G data plans as they do for bband these days 500-1500/- range
there will be cellphone type vertical growth in bband.

[Dileep]

To increase the last mile speed, BSNL need to retire all their old linemen and replace them with new well trained technicians. They still believe in twisting copper together as a means of connection, and getting the dial tone as validation of a good line.

[Suppiah]

Actually sometimes you have to pity the BSNL lower rung linemen. They carry instruments that could be auctioned off for huge prices as antiques at EBAY. They climb the poles like monkeys without any equipment. BSNL has stopped purchasing cables years ago, or so it seems, so they have to salvage bits of cables from here and there and provide links. A hundred feet link will have three or more joints each one put together in the most crude manner. This is okay for voice calls, but I doubt broadband can provide good speed on such links.

I think at lowest levels, based on my interaction, the realisation seems to be gradually dawning that you have to work ( ) and keep customers to prosper, if not survive. But the tendency is to blame 'private sector' and also 'management' for not ensuring staffing levels are adequate to take care of customers. They seem to seriously believe that BSNL is understaffed and they are overworked.

[Nayak]

I had a reasonably good experience when I applied for Broadband connection.

I went to Koramangala Exchange to pick up the BB forms. Dude gave me the forms.

I filled it up, got it signed by my mom and when I went to submit, uncle says, 'beta, go to National Games Village office, all BB connections are supposed to be approved there'.

One day gone, had to cut office and went to NGV to submit the forms, had to wait 3 hours for the afsar to stamp his approval

After two weeks, I still dont get the connection, went to NGV and complained, then a week later, 3 afsars on Bajaj Chetak with 2 line technicians drop in suddenly in the evening and set up the connection. When my PC boots up, up comes Priyanka's hot wallpaper. Hot one of her sitting with her legs apart, but it breaks the ice and senior afsar says, 'achha taste hain tera beta'.

Anyways, they were polite and courteous and did not demand any 'chai-paani'.

[krishnan]

Guess it all depends from place to place. Had mine up and running within a week after i gave the application. They set the modem in 2-3 days. But took some tome to activate the connection

[Nayak]

My BSNL dibba overheats like anything!! As usual a by-product of panda-poker assembly line material. Cheap, plasticky, over-heats, keeps skipping connections frequently.

[Singha]

must be the redoubtable huawei modem.