NTC shows profit surge despite corona crisis

Islamabad : Although Pakistan has been among the countries worst affected by COVID-19, yet the country’s important organization, National Telecommunication Corporation (NTC), surprisingly generated even more revenue on its own during the pandemic.

“This government entity in a crisis period managed to earn a profit to Rs578 million during the last financial year,” said MD National Telecommunication Corporation (NTC) Brigadier (r) Viqar Rashid Khan in an exclusive interview with ‘The News.’

The prudent action on part of MD NTC Brigadier (r) Viqar Rashid Khan saved the federal government from embarrassment during the pandemic.

Pakistan has been one of the countries, worst affected by COVID-19, as reportedly the country has reportedly lost one-third of its revenue and its exports dropped by 50 per cent due to COVID-19 outbreak and lockdown.

Whereas, the NTC in the times of corona crisis has earned a profit of Rs52 million during the financial year 2018-19 while during financial year 2019-20 it earned Rs578million profit. “It was quite a difficult task to complete the annual development plan in the corona crisis,” said the MD NTC mentioning that this government entity despite the unusual situation in the country has managed to complete 100 percent Annual Development Plan (ADP) during the financial year 2019-20, which is a record in the public sector. It is unheard in the history of Pakistan that any public sector organization completed its ADP in a calendar year.

To a question about the provision of uninterrupted services for virtual sessions to main government organisations, he said it was the need of the hour to hold important meetings virtually to evolve a strategy for avoiding the spread of coronavirus in the country.

“Since March 2020, video conference meetings have been arranged for PM House, President Secretariat, NCOC, Cabinet, ECC, CS KP, Planning Commission, Senate Secretariat, Ministry of Information Technology, ATC Court, NLCC and other government departments,” he said adding that the virtual meetings of standing committees of national assembly and Senate were also arranged by the NTC.

He said that NTC had successfully conducted PM’s address to Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Summit using a video link with Moscow. The organisation has conducted the Prime Minister’s address to the United Nations (UN) event on Financing for Development in the Covid-19 era.

The NTC has provided the facility to conduct the President's address to the Board of Trustees (BoT), in which 37 members from 7 different countries joined the online meeting.

About application hosting during the COVID-19, MD NTC said that NTC is hosting a project of the Ministry of Health ‘Yaran-e-Watan’, which includes hosting and bulk email facilitation through NTC Data Centre.

“It is also managing the registration portal for donors and beneficiaries for the BISP Ehsaas programme,” he said, adding that the NTC has provided a web portal for the Tele-Education program of the Ministry of Education and Professional Training.

About Website (COVID Website) hosting, the MD said Tiger Force registration was ensured through the Citizen Portal mobile application. The COVID-19 website (Sub-domains website) including crt.covid.gov.pk, crt.pmdu.gov.pk, and www.ncoc.gov.pk are giving services uninterruptedly.

“In unusual circumstances due to the spread of the deadly virus, the NTC has provided access from anywhere to the National Information Technical Board (NITB) for e-Office users to ensure work from home during COVID-19 pandemic,” he said, sharing the achievement of the organisation.