While the phones to telecom employees will be rent-free, according to the`negotiated' package, the bonus demanded by employees will now be restrictedto 70 days (instead of the 73 demanded by them), and the number of freecalls will be kept at 150 instead of 250.

Briefing the press after the hour-long compromise meeting called for byPrime Minister Vajpayee and attended by both Paswan and finance ministerYashwant Sinha on Saturday, principal secretary Brajesh Mishra said `thepackage was negotiated after careful deliberations' and that it was subjectto the employees co-operation to the corporatisation of the department oftelecom services by October 1 this year.

Mishra said the corporatised Department of Telecom Services would be calledthe Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited. Mishra made the announcement in thepresence of both Paswan and Sinha. How little Paswan's initial package waschanged can be judged from the fact that the original date in any case forcorporatisation of the DTS was around September this year. The reason why itseemed that the date had been advanced is that Paswan had been maintainingthat the corporatisation would take place only in the beginning of nextyear.

Similarly, keeping the bonus for 1999-00 at 70 days instead of 73 is just asaving of Rs 36 crore which is very small when compared to the loss incurred.The Paswan-Sinha battle came out into the open when a few days after Paswanannounced his largesse, Sinha opposed the move.

The finance minister in an interview with The Financial Express hadsaid proper user charges should be paid by everyone for all facilities liketelephones, water and electricity.

Sinha's comment came after the full telecom commission cleared the proposalto give free telephones to the telecom employees.

The agenda of the commission said that the total financial implication ofthe decision to provide rent free phones to the working employees would be anon-recurring expenditure of Rs 24 crore on the waiver of installationcharge and a recurring expenditure of Rs 68 crore and Rs 9.9 crore loss ofinterest on security deposit.

Meanwhile, Bhartiya Janata Party today said that Paswan should havediscussed the proposal with the Prime minister before making anyannouncement in this regard.

BJP vice-president JP Mathur said it would have been better on the part ofthe communications minister to have consulted the PM before announcing it.Mathur said there would be a lot of financial implications of the proposaland hence the finance minister also should have been taken into confidence.