Jamshedpur, April 27: The BSNL has adopted tough measures to extract pending dues from its post-paid cellphone users.

In its first ever move, the BSNL authorities today charged a section of CellOne subscribers with defaulting government money by not paying the bills. Consumers failing to foot the cellphone bills in time may land in trouble and can even be implicated in criminal case. The BSNL?s local circle authorities have in an FIR lodged with the Sitaramdera police station alleged 29 CellOne subscribers to have defaulted about Rs 35 lakh by evading bill payment.

According to the FIR, the defaulters have neither paid their bills nor responded to bill clearance notices sent to them. The BSNL authorities have furnished details of bills pending against the defaulters and the correspondence that the BSNL had done with them while trying to realise the amount.

While submitting the FIR, the BSNL authorities have urged the police to take appropriate action against the accused and arrest them in accordance with the law. Smriti Halder, who heads BSNL?s account office, told The Telegraph that the measure of realisation of telephone bills is a routine work and something, which had been agreed upon between the BSNL and the consumers.

?Although the step is unusual, it is a routine work, which was already agreed between the BSNL and the consumers,? she said.

The deputy general manager (finance), K.N. Jha, said these outstanding dues were pertaining to old cases.

?The defaulters might have made ISD calls or used roaming facility leading to an inflated bill,? said the DGM (finance), adding that more customers would be taken to task in the coming months.

He also said the department would realise the outstanding dues even though it means getting the defaulters? assets attached.

But the DGM declined to say anything about the total outstanding amount on the CellOne head, claiming it to be an internal matter of the department.

There are 27,637 pre-paid cellphone users and 10,565 post-paid users under BSNL?s Jamshedpur circle.The ones subscribing to the post-paid cellphones have to clear the bill monthly.

The CellOne users have taken the move by the BSNL authorities with a pinch of salt. One of the customers, Gautam Singh, said, ?The move is an internal issue of the BSNL. But outstanding amount running into lakhs on individual level is beyond our imagination. There must be some foul play behind the episode.? Another Cell-One user, Pankaj Chowdhury, a businessman, said, ?Being a leading service provider. BSNL should upgrade its customer service, and should be more transparent and professional while dealing with the customers.?