ET&T screens to blank out forever

ET&T, whose Mumbai unit is in Andheri, is a PSU that develops computer software and imparts computer education with private participation. Now, ET&T employees allege that it is the powerful lobby of private computer institutes that is behind the closure plan as ET&T bags several lucrative contracts for both the central and state governments.

“The decision was taken without taking the corporation into confidence,” says ET&T Spokesperson, K Kandaswamy. He says the matter came up for discussion at a meeting of the Disinvestment Commission in New Delhi on September 22. “Ironically, the meeting was convened to discuss the increase in petroleum prices. It was then that they decided to implement the 1997 report, which had recommended the closure as the corporation had been running up losses then,” he says. The report, he explains, had made various recommendations on 83 PSUs, including ET&T.

Adds NJR Deshmukh, assistant manager, II projects, marketing, “There is no reason to shut the company as it has been posting profits since the last two years: Rs 70 lakh in 1998-99 and Rs 1.75 crore in 1999-2000. Unfortunately, we learnt of the plan to close the corporation through the press and are yet obe officially intimated.”

Kandaswamy explains that the corporation had signed a Memornadum of Understanding with the Department of Information Technology (Union Ministry of Science and Technology) in 1997 on the implementation of revised wages. “The proposed closure is therefore a breach of trust,” he told Newsline. The MoU had been signed on the understanding that the corporation would withdraw a case regarding a wage dispute that it had filed in the Supreme Court.

Kandaswamy says closing down the corporation will cost the government dear as it will take time and money to transfer projects being executed by ET&T to alternative companies. Thousands of students who have enrolled with ET&T for various courses will also be affected, he points out.

Deshmukh says that Union Minister for Disinvestment, Arun Shourie, had admitted that there is no need to shut the corporation and it could opt for partial disinvestment. “He told us in New Delhi in September that if we could provide convincing reasons why the corporation should remain with the government, he would see that it is partly bought out by a private firm. The other alternative is official bidding on the basis of brand equity or its market value,” he says.

TUBEWATCH
* ET&T was set up as a nodal canalising agency in 1982, which means it had the sole right to import colour picture tubes and other chips and to distribute these all over India. It was the first company to bring colour TV to India during the Asiad in 1982.
* It is an importer of teletext decoders distributes these to end users like various government departments and undertakings.
* It was the first one to launch the people’s computer’ at a cost less than that of a colour TV (less than Rs 10,000).
* Between 1992 and 1995, it was ranked as the second largest exporter of colour TVs to Germany, which amounted to one-lakh-odd sets.
* It organises corporate training programmes for various government departments, nationalised banks and the armed forces.
* It undertakes a variety of IT-related projects for both the state and the central governments, including computerisation of Asia’s largest Sabji Mandi, for Delhi.