1851:

The sprawling Posts and Telegraphs Department, for instance, occupied a small corner of the public works department, in.

Dr. William O’Shaughnessy pioneered telegraph and telephone in India belonged to the Public Works Department.

1854:

A regular, separate department was opened, when telegraph facilities were thrown open to the public.

1854-57:

The Telegraph Department comprised a Superintendent of Telegraphs.

Three Deputy Superintendents at Bombay, Madras and Peguin Burma, Inspectors at Indore, Agra, Kanpur and Banaras and an operating and maintenance staff .

Dr. O'Shaughnessy was the first Superintendent of Electric Telegraphs in India and later became the first Director General.

Indo-European Telegraph Department, later known as the Overseas Communications, was administered by a Director-in-Chief whose headquarters was in London.

15th February, 1888 :

Merged with the Director-General of the Indian Telegraph Department.

1914:

World War I, Postal Department and the Telegraph Department were amalgamated under a single Director-General.

April, 1925:

The accounts of the Indian Posts and Telegraphs were reconstituted to examine the true fiscal profile of the department.

The attempt was to find out the extent to which the department was imposing a burden on the taxpayers.

1st April, 1950:

In 1950 the number of Telephone Exchanges absorbed from princely states was 196.

The installed capacity of these 196 exchanges was 13,362 lines with 11,296 working connections.

31st December, 1984:

Postal, telegraph and telephone services were managed by the Posts and Telegraphs Department till this date.

January 1985:

Two separate Departments for the Posts and the Telecommunications were created.

The accounts of the department, initially, were maintained by the Accountant General of the P&T.

The Telecommunication Board consisted of the Secretary Telecommunications, who was the Chairman with Member (Finance), Member (Operations), Member (Development), Member (Personnel) and Member (Technology).

1986:

Bombay and Delhi Telephones were separated to create the new entity called Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd. (MTNL).

1st October 2000:

BSNL was created , a new entity to operate services in different parts of the country as a public sector unit.