TRAI has issued a regulation, mandating interconnection amongst all telecom service providers for intelligent network (IN) services. The regulation aims to ensure that services available through IN are not restricted to only subscribers of service providers who have deployed an IN platform but also to subscribers of other operators.
At present, consumers are offered a number of innovative services through IN deployed by service providers in their network. The more popular ones are free phone, toll-free number and virtual calling card for long distance calls. However, in the existing multi-service, multi-operator environment, these services can only be accessed by subscribers of a specific service provider and not by those of other service providers.
To enable subscribers of different service providers to access the IN services of other service providers, TRAI had set up an expert group to look into the related technical and regulatory issues. Based on the recommendations of the group, TRAI has mandated that no operator will be permitted to block his consumers from accessing the IN platform of another service provider so as to ensure that all telecom consumers have access to multioperator multi-service IN platforms.
TRAI states: “No basic operator, cellular mobile service provider or unified access service provider shall directly or indirectly deny its consumers access to IN services of his choice, which are available in a multi-operator multi-network scenario.”
To ensure this, service providers would be required to enter into commercial and technical agreements within three months. The technical architecture and revenue share among service providers have to be mutually decided upon based on the principles of reciprocity and nondiscrimination. Also, service providers have to comply with the various provisions and access code allocated as per the National Numbering Plan.
