The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) may implement guidelines pertaining to unsolicited calls and text messages in August 2011.
TRAI had announced the new guidelines in 2010, under which telemarketers who called customers registered with the Do Not Call (DNC) registry would face fines of Rs 75,000 for the first violation and up to Rs 0.25 million for the sixth offence, after which they would be blacklisted for two years.
As per the new guidelines, users will have a choice of blocking only telemarketing voice calls while choosing to receive text messages. Even when receiving messages, the customer can specify certain areas, such as banking, financial products, real estate, education, health, etc. Registered telemarketers would not be permitted to send any commercial communications between 9 pm and 9 am, even to unregistered customers.
Moreover, it is believed that TRAI had sent a fresh communication to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), requesting that it complete the process of allotting the 140 number series to all telemarketers by the end of June.
Once this process is completed, operators will require between four and six weeks to install the requisite filtering mechanisms on their networks.
