Forest department call centre to fix call drop issue

Mumbai: With 50 per cent call drops and feedback messages not being delivered, the forest department’s call centre is in need for an immediate overhaul. While the department has asked the service provider (MTNL), to provide better services, it has also started conducting weekly review meetings to discuss if the right amount of feedback has been received for the week or not.

In the review meeting, the chief conservator of forests (CCF) across the state tallies the number of calls received by the call centre with number of feedbacks. The CCFs are also giving feedbacks to its Information Technology department. The CCF of Thane Territorial Range team members’ expert, Mr Sunil Limaye had been for a round to the Goregaon based state call centre and shared his observations, with the department. First of its kind in the country, the call centre was inaugurated by the forest minister Sudhir Mungantiwar on January 7, in order to help people deal with emergencies.  

Once a person calls in case of emergency, he/she is asked to directly dial ‘0’ and is connected to the attendee, who further connects the person to the officer of the mentioned area via conference call in order to understand the exact location in the discussion. After this, the caller receives a call back to inform that his/her issue has been addressed and/or resolved. In case of other inquiries, the caller is given four options: 1. Self introduction, 2. Select the mode of language, 3. Choices in menu for specific information (if anyone would want to enquire about sanctuaries/ national parks/ Tiger reserves) and 4. Contact numbers of forest department and general information.