The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is planning to reduce the number of Indian Telecommunication Service (ITS) officers posted at its headquarters in Delhi as part of a move to rationalise its workforce, according to officials aware of the development.
The DoT currently has around 250 ITS officers at its headquarters. The department is now looking to reduce this number and shift over 100 officers to field units under the Director General of Telecommunications (DGT), including Licensed Service Areas (LSAs), as well as to other departments within the Ministry of Communications.
Communications Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia is expected to hold a meeting on 27 August to decide on the restructuring and the number of ITS officers to be retained at the headquarters. The file related to the meeting has already been examined, according to officials.
Under the proposed restructuring, more than 100 officers could be moved out of the headquarters. The ministry is expected to retain officers primarily for policy-related work, while others could be deployed in field units or moved to other departments.
“Due to overstaffing, several departments have more staff than required, which is affecting the efficiency of the ministry. In some departments, as many as eight people are involved in moving a single file. Such overstaffing does not improve productivity; instead, it sometimes delays the movement of files,” said an official.
Two other officials confirmed that the minister is expected to take a decision on the number of officers to be retained at the headquarters.
The move comes days after the government decided to reduce the deployment of ITS officers in Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), with the state-run telecom company eventually expected to be run by its own employees.
Scindia has asked BSNL to use its internal cadre for succession planning so that employees can gain experience in senior positions, according to a Department of Telecommunications (DoT) letter to BSNL Chairman A Robert J Ravi dated April 9, 2026.