- The VIP mobile number was up for sale on BSNL’s online portal.
- The number had been on auction for a week
- A potato trader from Kota in Rajasthan came out as the winner with an outrageous bid of Rs 2.4 lakh.
BSNL may be having a tough time for the past few months, with the telecom operator continuing to lose market share in the Indian wireless subscriber segment in August as well in September as well. But the certain so-called ‘VIP’ numbers from the national telecom carrier still carry a lot of prestige value for people who like to keep catchy contact details. In one such incident, a potato trader from Kota (Rajasthan) reportedly bought a BSNL VIP number that ends with six zeros in a row for Rs 2.4 lakh!
As per the leading Hindi daily, Navbharat Times, a BSNL VIP number with digits XXX7000000 was up for sale on BSNL’s online portal where people can bid in auctions for such numbers. The number was available for a week, with different auction bids coming for it. The bid for the number initially started at Rs 20,000 and finally went beyond Rs 2 lakh (2,00,000).
The winner of the auction with a bid of Rs 2.4 lakh and the new owner of the said BSNL mobile number is Tanuj Dudeja from Kota who is a potato trader by profession. The winner collected the mobile number, after submitting the winning bid in the BSNL office in Farrukhabad, Uttar Pradesh. he also finally collected the number from Farrukhabad only.
As per one BSNL employee, Mr. Dudeja likes to keep VIP mobile numbers. The Rs 2.4 lakh VIP number is his second buy as he had also bought another number for Rs 1 lakh earlier. There are many other VIP numbers available on BSNL’s website as well. To buy any such number, prospective buyers need to first put in a bid, and the highest bidder over a period of time gets to choose the number.
