The Karnataka circle of BSNL is seriously considering doing away with the printing of telephone directories of its telecom districts. The telephone directories of a number of districts are overdue and there are no signs of BSNL coming out with new directories.

It has been more than three years since the Gulbarga Telecom District (TD) brought out its directory, while Belgaum TD is said to have not printed the directory for the last four years. Several north Karnataka telecom districts do not print directories periodically.

With hundreds of phones being surrendered and several new lines added in the last three years, it has become a Herculean task to trace the number. Added to this is the fact that most numbers belonging to State government departments have changed. BSNL feels printing a voluminous directory would be a huge financial burden, as it does not get enough revenue out of it. Many have switched to cellphones, while a substantial number have been surrendering their landlines. The printing of Gulbarga telephone directory alone would cost not less than Rs 30 lakh.

There may even be disputes and arbitrations between the Nigam and the printer. In case of Belgaum telecom district the arbitration between the directory printer and the BSNL has been going on for a long time now. Nigam officials feel that using the directory has drastically come down, as mobile users store numbers on their cell phone. Moreover, the rural people hardly use them.