July 10, 2006	Monday	Jumadi-ul-Sani 13, 1427

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HARIPUR, July 9: The Haripur unit of the Telephone Industries of Pakistan (TIP) may be closed because the factory has not received new production orders over the past six months, informed sources told Dawn.

They said the Ministry of Information Technology was likely to hand over the TIP building to the Higher Education Commission for setting up an engineering university and shift its machinery to the National Radio Telecom Corporation, Haripur, another public sector unit managed by the Pakistan Army.

Sources in the TIP said the ministry planned to close the TIP and shift its machinery to the nearby building of the NRTC and hand over the building to the HEC.

The TIP was a subsidiary of the PTCL before privatisation with over 70 per cent shares. Due to public pressure, the Privatisation Commission had shelved the plan to privatise the TIP and had only sold out the Carrier Telephone Industry (CTI), Islamabad, a sister organisation of the TIP, to Siemens of Germany, which also held 30 per cent shares in the TIP, Haripur, in the shape of technical inputs.

The TIP, since its establishment in early 1950s, had been fulfilling PTCL’s 90 per cent telecom-related requirements for its annual development plan. It has the manufacturing capacity of 500,000 digital lines, 500,000 telephone sets, 100,000 metres of drop wire, 30,000 distribution boxes and 1,000 mobile container exchanges a year, besides other accessories used in the telecommunication system. It also has the capacity to manufacture 300,000 energy meters per annum.

However, the invasion of foreign companies in the local telecom market has affected the production of the TIP.

The sources said the IT ministry had declared the TIP a loss-bearing unit, which had so far suffered a loss of Rs1.430 billion and had taken an overdraft of Rs1 billion from local banks.

But Malik Mohammad Riaz, general secretary of the Employees and Workers Union, TIP, disputed the loss claims and said “certain hidden hands” supporting MNCs had started conspiracies and had made it to offer golden handshake to its over 2000 workers.