MTNL Q4 net loss narrows to Rs 1,099 cr

State-run MTNL has pruned its losses by 30% to Rs 1,099.5 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 31, 2011, and is hoping to return into black soon with the help of new initiatives taken by the PSU.

The company had a net loss of Rs 1,573.7 crore in the January-March quarter last year, MTNL said in a statement.

"We have taken some initiatives to generate additional sources of revenue and we are confident that these operational losses would completely be wiped out soon," MTNL Chairman and Managing Director Kuldeep Singh said.

For the full year 2010-11, the company has posted a net loss of Rs 2,826 crore, up 8.27% from Rs 2,610.9 crore in the same period previous year. While the total income rose to Rs 3,841.2 crore as against Rs 3,781 during the period under consideration.

In fact "our revenue year on year basis has shown improvement and operational losses have come down significantly during the last quarter (Q4)," Singh added.

MTNL’s broadband and 3G services continued to grow. MTNL despite the fact that it provides broadband services only in Delhi and Mumbai, has become the third largest broadband service providers in the entire country with 9,42,317 broadband subscribers on its roll.

"The company had deployed enough capacity for mobile and broadband connections to meet the growing demand," MTNL said in a statement.

An amount of Rs 301.4 crore is accounting for by MTNL towards wet lease for infrastructure and other services provided by MTNL in respect of Commonwealth Games during the year out of which Rs 242 crore has been received during the year.

As per fiscal 2009-10, the company's manpower stood at 44,910.

MTNL’s 3G/2G GSM Subscriber base has gone up to 51,99,337 subscribers from 51,15,245 as on December 31, 2010 in a short period of time.

Shares of MTNL today closed at Rs 45.25 on the BSE, up 0.11% from the previous close.