New Delhi:  Officers of a specialised telecom service cadre alleged that the government was not utilising their high-tech skills and "many of them are just sitting idle and drawing salaries" when they could be placed within various telecom cells to help monitor this fast-growing industry.
"We all belong to reputed institutes including IITs and many of us joined service after resigning from reputed PSUs. We did not opt to get absorbed in BSNL/ MTNL as the offered terms and conditions did not meet our legitimate aspirations," a representative of Indian Telecommunication Service Association (ITSA)
"Considering the larger public interest, the government should strengthen the role of ITS officers in areas like TERM (Telecom Enforcement, Resource and Monitoring) cells, effective consumer grievance redressal cells, special purpose vehicle for NOFN (National Optical Fibre Network), management of secure defence network and promotion of indigenous telecom equipment manufacturing," he added.
Indian Telecommunication Service (ITS) Group 'A' officers are meant for framing and implementing government policies and managing overall growth of telecom sector in India.
In 2005, 2008 and 2011 most of these officers were put in BSNL and MTNL on deemed deputation and were offered the option to get absorbed. However, except 12, the rest of the ITS officers did not opt to get absorbed into these companies.
"For those who did not choose to join the public sector firms, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) issued a repatriation order on Nov 3 and asked them to come to New Delhi, sit idle and draw salary without work," the ITSA representative alleged.
"Making these ITS officers sit idle, when the growth of telecom and IT is at its peak, and pay them salary from public exchequer to the tune of 250 crore per annum will result in wastage of both unique national talent as well as public money," he added.
The officers urged the government to deploy them to various field units where they could help implement many of the upcoming infrastructure development projects.
"The new telecom policy has envisaged building capacity in many areas and so the DoT will require additional expertise," said the official.