Roaming charges cut by 33%, Bharti & Hutch will slash rates from May 1. |
Cellular service providers Bharti, Hutch and Idea today slashed roaming charges by 33 per cent to Rs 1.99 a minute. |
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While Bharti and Hutch will reduce the charges from May 1, Idea has not specified a date but a spokesperson said the decision could be taken sooner. |
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The announcement came within hours of Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran's suggestion that private players should reduce roaming charges. |
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At a summit organised by the Cellular Operators Association of India, Maran said private operators should emulate Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd, which did not charge any roaming tariff and only billed subscribers for long-distance calls. |
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Bharti claimed it was the first to comply with the minister's vision of "One India", while Idea said it had cut tariffs to help improve telecom reach. |
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Hutch said the timing was appropriate since summer vacations were around the corner and a large number of subscribers would be holidaying. |
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Bharti Group Chairman Sunil Mittal and Hutch Managing Director Asim Ghosh were present at the Cellular Summit. |
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Replying to the industry's demand to allow BSNL share its infrastructure in rural areas with other players, Maran said, "BSNL had taken the initiative to areas where private operators did not go. I do not know what stops private operators from going there. The government has been giving, giving and giving. The private operators have been only taking, taking and taking." |
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Mittal proposed doing away with all levies, including the lincence fee, for telecom operators to reduce the call tariffs further. "Only service tax should stay and we will pass all the benefits to the consumers," he said. |
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Maran said this was an inter-ministerial matter and he would take up the matter with other government departments. |
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Mittal also demanded better allocation of points of interconnection to which the minister responded by saying that a committee to iron out the glitches was being set up so that the private players did not have any complaints against BSNL. |
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Mittal said that the government should not provide any subsidy for limited mobility services and added that telecom industry had matured. |
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'We are no more at war with the government or within the industry. We will fight for our marketshare and we will fight our bloody wars on the streets, like any other industry,' he said. |
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In his address at the event, BSNL chairman AK Sinha said that the state-owned players had drawn up plans to corner 50 per cent of the additions in the cellular market place in the coming years. |
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'The minister has set a target of 250 million phones by 2007 and the mobile segment will play a crucial role. We want BSNL and MTNL to account for 50 per cent of the market and we will provide 75-80 million connections over the next three years,' he said. |
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Sinha called for better spectrum allocation for meeting the targets and said that the award should be equitable. |
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Maran launched a low-priced mobile handset from Motorola costing about Rs 1,500 and said, 'This would prove to be the crucial factor for future growth of telephony in the country and will go a long way in achieving the target of 250 million subscriber by 2008.' |
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