Govt examining 11-digit mobile numbers

With the explosive growth in the mobile telephony, the government is understood to have begun the exercise to amend the numbering plan to migrate to 11-digit cellular number from the current 10-digit in order to accommodate more users.

A senior Department of Telecom (DoT) official said the proposal is there and a committee had suggested this. But he added that nothing has been finalised yet, therefore, no direction has been sent to the operators.

According to telecom regulator Trai, the wireless subscriber base increased by 16.67 million during October 2009, taking the total number of subscribers to 488 million.

According to an internal DoT note, the National Numbering Plan 2003 is to be amended for migration to 11-digit numbering plan in mobile services by prefixing digit '9'.

Although the DoT note said operators need to make necessary arrangements for the migration from January 1, some operators said they are not ready for such an early migration.

The DoT's technical arm, Telecom Engineering Centre (TEC), had recommended the new numbering plan.

The DoT had come up with a 30-year numbering plan in 2003 but the fast growth in the telecom subscriber base has forced the authority to relook into its policy and consider 11-digit numbering system.