Crossed wires stupefy subscribers

SURAT, July 28: If you dial a diamond merchant and end up talking to a grocer or find yourself on line to a paan shop-owner when you have...

SURAT, July 28: If you dial a diamond merchant and end up talking to a grocer or find yourself on line to a paan shop-owner when you have called up a vice-chancellor, or when an abusive voice rudely tells you none of the people you are asking for live at that number, don8217;t curse yourself for your ineptitude with numbers.

Blame your miseries, instead, on the Surat Telephone directory, the complimentary tome subscribers get from the telecom department. Subscribers are now paying a heavy price for this freebie, last published in 1994.

Now, four years is a pretty long time, even in view of the sluggish pace at which the department works. By a conservative estimate, at least 60 per cent of the numbers have changed since then. The inquiry number, 197, often plays will o8217; the wisp, leaving the subscriber no option but that outdated reference book. By all accounts, the process is a frustrating one for the caller as well as those at the other end. Ironically, the department is well aware of the confusion the new levels and exchanges have been causing, but its efforts to come up with a new directory have met with no success.

Traditionally, the department does not print the directory, but contracts it out to a private company in return of the royalties and free copies for its subscribers. The company recovers its investments through the yellow pages section, which again, attracts advertisers because of the white pages with the numbers and vital information about the department.

Between 1989 and 1994, there was only one respondent to the tender the department floated, Sesa Seat. This company published the directory five times between 1989 and 1994. After the five-year contract lapsed, however, the parties could not agree on terms.

The department insisted the company give free copies to all its 1.5 lakh subscribers, in addition to paying the royalties, but Sesa Seat says it can give copies to only 65 per cent of them.Telecom officials insist that their contract with Sesa Seat be renewed at the same terms and conditions. Surat Telecom General Manager Y P Kataria told Express Newsline, 8220;The department is not getting quotations from other companies. So Sesa Seat is blackmailing us indirectly due to the monopoly it enjoys.8221;

Kataria is not ready to agree to the company8217;s condition of not supplying free copies to term of not supplying free copies to all subscribers. 8220;We will negotiate for free copies for 70 per cent of the subscribers and buy the rest from the company, as a last option8221;, he says.

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Since it8217;s a policy decision, requiring an okay from higher authorities, he wrote to the Department of Telecom three months ago and is still awaiting a reply.

Dismissing the blackmail charge, Sesa Seat8217;s Pune-based general manager corporate affairs V Srinivas Rao points out that since the number of subscribers have nearly trebled since the contract was signed in 1989, 8220;revenue and cost considerations don8217;t permit us to continue with the old terms and conditions8221;.

Rao says the department is facing the same scenario in Chennai, where it was insisting on similar terms, while the going was smooth in Delhi and Mumbai 8220;where they buy all copies from us8221;.