Tata Teleservices sacks a dozen circle chiefs, puts 3 on notice

For a dozen senior executives of Tata Teleservices Ltd (TTSL), it was Monday blues like no other: they lost their jobs.

Three others have been put on notice and are expected to be shunted out.

The circle operating officers of the company’s CDMA — or code division multiple access — division asked to leave were stationed across telecom circles in North, South and East India.

According to a source familiar with the development, operational inefficiency was cited as the reason for the sacking.

A Tata Tele spokesperson did not respond to detailed queries from DNA. An email sent to N Srinath, chief executive, did not elicit a response either.

CDMA and global system for mobile communications or GSM are the two technology standards used by mobile operators for offering cellular telephony services. Most operators in India as well as other parts of the world use GSM standard.

TTSL, originally a CDMA operator (Tata Indicom) which later switched to GSM (Tata Docomo), has a structure where the entire operations of a telecom circle is headed by a circle operating officer.

India has 23 telecom circles in all.

Of the 15 executives, one source said, there is a possibility of three being moved to newer assignments and retained within the organisation, but the other dozen have been asked to leave with immediate effect and have been offered three to eight months’ salary as severance package depending on seniority.

The move is believed to be part of Tata Tele’s efforts to better align its CDMA operations with the larger and more popular GSM operations to reduce operational redundancy and improve cost structures.

From owning more than a quarter of India’s overall subscriber base, CDMA users have shrunk to about 15% now.

After the introduction of mobile number portability nearly six months back, there has been an acceleration in the exodus of CDMA users who complain about lack of choice when it comes to handsets supporting the technology.

According to another source, Tata Tele has also made some high-level shuffles in the management team on Monday, which included the elevation of Vineet Bhatia, who currently heads the Delhi circle, with additional responsibility as regional head for northern India. It wasn’t immediately clear what new role Bhatia would have.

Further operational rationalisation is expected in the CDMA operations as Tata Tele focuses more on its GSM operations, the source said.