Telecom companies will invest over Rs 1500 crore this year in West Bengal to improve rural connectivity and mobile telecom penetration.
The companies are also planning to offer differentiated tariff structures to push mobile subscriber base in rural West Bengal.
The move comes in the wake of the government deciding to give financial incentives to operators who roll out services in rural areas.
The Department of Telecom has recently waived the licence fee from revenues earned from fixed line phones in rural areas. DOT's aim is to achieve rural tele-density of 25 per cent by means of 200 million rural connections at the end of the Eleventh Plan.
Currently, while India's tele-density is nearly 30 per cent, in rural areas it is only 8 per cent, according to industry body TRAI.
While most private operators claim they cover upto 90 per cent of Bengal, more than 95 per cent of rural phones are owned by Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) and, therefore, neither of the private players stands to gain immediately from DoT's decision. However, the incentives has prompted private operators to start rolling out services in the rural areas.
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For one, Tata Indicom will invest over Rs 150 crore in strengthening its presence in Bengal and setting up over 150 cell sites.
According to Sanjiv Sinha, regional head - East & COO, Kolkata circle of Tata Indicom, "We will expand retail presence in Bengal by 30 per cent and also introduce new tariff structures which are affordable for rural Bengal."
Bundled handset offers that are as low as Rs 799 and tariffs like free local Tata to Tata and 0.49 paisa from Tata to other local mobile phones, are some of the initiatives that the company believes will help push rural telephony in Bengal.
Likewise, Reliance Communications will concentrate on 'special products' that would make mobility 50 per cent cheaper compared to urban Bengal.
According to S P Shukla, president – personal business, Reliance Communications, "Reliance has always been the pioneer of affordable telecommunication for the masses. After bringing down cost of calls, validity and devices in urban India which triggered unprecedented market growth, we will now do the same for the rural population. This will not only usher in new levels of affordability for telephony but also create improved productivity for the Indian rural population through various new, user-friendly and affordable value added services."
Some of the new Reliance schemes for rural markets include going mobile for just Rs 49, which includes a new activated pre-paid SIM card. This price is a 50 per cent discount over the cost of going mobile in urban areas. Customers are free to choose any validity, talk-time or tariff propositions on this card.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), on its part, will invest Rs 530 crore over the next one year to strenthen its rural telecom infrastructure in West Bengal.
According to Soumya Ray, chief general manager of BSNL, "We are banking on 3G spectrum for rolling out more value-added-services (VAS) in West Bengal. Besides ring tones, we will ofer the convenience of sending SMSs in the mother tongue, thanks to our recent tie-up with Geneva Software Technologies Limited."
Likewise, Bharti Airtel has joined hands with Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative limited (IFFCO) to launch a joint venture company IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited (IKSL).
According to U S Awasthi, managing director, IFFCO, "IFFCO is present in about 98 percent of villages throughout the country and Airtel would use IKSL as a vehicle to make its mobile telecom services reach the rural masses."
Benefits include IKSL offering affordable mobile handsets bundled with Airtel mobile connection.
The farmer will also get access to a VAS platform that will broadcast five free voice messages on mandi prices, farming techniques, weather forecasts, diary farming, animal husbandry, rural health initiatives and fertiliser availability, etc, on a daily basis. In addition, the farmer will be able to call a dedicated helpline, manned by experts from various fields, to get answers to their specific queries.
Airtel will offer competitive calling rates at 50 paise per minute for calls between IFFCO members.
Airtel will also set up towers at sites provided by IFFCO societies to provide quality services to farmers.
Vodafone, on its part, will depend on tariffs, value-added-services and network strengthening to grow its base in rural Bengal.
According to Sridhar Rao, CEO – east of Vodafone, "Our major offering for the interior market will be our network, customer service and affordable plans along with affordable Vodafone handsets. These and a variety of bonus cards will make the tariffs even more affordable keeping individual subscriber needs in mind."
According to telecom analysts, the next wave of mobility would come from the rural pockets.
Significantly, the majority of new subscribers are now coming from towns and villages with populations of less than 20,000. The mobile network now covers over half of the nearly 6,00,000 towns and villages. The mobile services can now be bought from nearly a million outlets, a number that far exceeds the number of FMCG or even the postal outlets.
Madhusudan Gupta, senior research analyst at Gartner, said, "The growth in the mobile subscriber base is on the back of a rapidly proliferating rural market, lower handset costs, and low tariff rates in the Indian market. Call rates have further dropped to about 1.5 cents per minute narrowing the gap with fixed-line rates. These factors along with an increasing competitive landscape will fuel market growth and encourage the adoption of wireless services in the rural and semi-urban provinces of India."