According to data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), 1.7 million users have changed their service provider under the mobile number portability (MNP) facility. MNP was introduced on a pilot basis in Haryana on November 25, 2010 and was rolled out on a pan- India-basis on January 20, 2011.
Of the total 1.71 million requests received, about 0.22 million were from the Haryana circle. Gujarat saw the highest number of switching requests at 0.16 million, followed by Rajasthan (0.14 million) in Zone-I (the Northern and Western India).
In MNP Zone-II (the Southern and Eastern region), the maximum number of requests were received in the Karnataka and Tamil Nadu (0.11million) circles.
The regulator has said it is constantly monitoring implementation of the service. It noted that certain requests were rejected by telecom operators because subscribers had quoted an incorrect unique porting code (a unique number given to a subscriber who wants to change his operator) in the porting form. Applications were also rejected on account of non-payment of outstanding bills and non-completion of 90 days from the date of activation of mobile number.
TRAI has also asked operators to strictly comply with the provisions of MNP regulations, based on complaints received from subscribers stating they were unable to start the process.
