About 5.6 million mobile users having Uninor connections are up for grabs in Kolkata and West Bengal.
Uninor, which has been operating in both Kolkata and West Bengal telecom circles since December 2009, will lose validity of its licences in Kolkata, West Bengal and Mumbai telecom circles on January 18, 2013.
Uninor has already stopped taking new subscribers in Kolkata and West Bengal circles, according to local retailers. Uninor has 1.8 million customers in Kolkata out of the total 15.31 million GSM users in the circle, while more than 3.7 million subscribers use Uninor connections of the total 33.82 million mobile phone users in West Bengal telecom circle.
Uninor subscribers will now have to either port their numbers or will have to use their talk-time before the stipulated period before the service is being closed down officially.
However, leaders in the market – Bharti Airtel and Vodafone are not doing anything specific at the moment to woo these customers. Said an industry insider, Uninor customers are on the lower end and with a low ARPU (average revenue per user), and a large chunk of these would automatically come to the market leaders.
When asked, both Bharti Airtel and Vodafone declined comments on the issue.
“Uninor has valid licenses to offer mobile telephony services in Kolkata and West Bengal till January 18, 2013. Our customers can therefore continue to benefit from Uninor’s ‘sabse sasta’ services until any other decision is taken on our future operations in these circles,” said a spokesperson at Uninor.
In February, the Supreme Court has cancelled 122 telecom licences, which included pan-India licences for Uninor, issued in 2008 by the then telecom minister A Raja.
Uninor, which is backed by Norway-based Telenor, has secured licences for six telecom circles -- Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh East, Uttar Pradesh West, Bihar, Gujarat and Maharashtra, in the recently closed auction of 1800 MHz spectrum. But, it had stayed away from bidding for Kolkata, West Bengal and Mumbai telecom circles, clearly indicating that these circles are not under company’s radar in the immediate future.
Earlier in July-August, Uninor has trimmed operations to nine circles from 13 circles. That time it had stopped services in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka and Orissa.
While discontinuing operations in these circles, Uninor had informed its customers through SMS, about a month prior to discontinuation, asking them to either port or to use full talk-time, said an Orissa resident who used to a Uninor subscriber.
In October alone, Uninor has lost 2.11 lakh subscribers in Kolkata and 3.21 lakh customers in West Bengal circles, according to data available with Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI).
Telenor had entered Indian market in 2009 through a joint venture (JV) with real estate giant Unitech Group but now has bought back its stake in the JV. The Norway-based telecom service provider, which would operate in India under the name of Telewings Communication Servives has recently sold a 26 per cent stake to Mumbai-based Lakshdeep Investments & Finance.
