The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has asked various operators, including Bharti airtel and Vodafone Essar, to furnish more information pertaining to their decision to increase mobile tariffs by up to 20 per cent.
TATA DOCOMO first doubled its net tariffs for GSM services in Tamil Nadu (from Re 0.01 per six seconds to per three seconds), followed by other circles. The operator also doubled STD call rates for new subscribers after a year of connection and increased local and national SMS charges by 67 per cent and 25 per cent respectively.
Thereafter, Bharti airtel followed suit and increased its tariffs by 20 per cent for prepaid subscribers in the Delhi, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat circles.
Following this, Idea Cellular and Vodafone Essar also increased tariffs for their prepaid plans in select circles while Bharti airtel applied its new tariffs to other circles. Idea increased its tariff from Re 0.01 per second to Re 0.012 per second for all calls to other networks in the Delhi service area under the per-second billing scheme, before revising call and SMS rates for circles like Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.
Vodafone Essar, on the other hand, increased tariffs in 12 circles from Re 0.01 per second to Re 0.12-Re 0.15 per second.
The hike in tariffs evoked a mixed reaction from the industry. While the six new operators adopted a wait-and-watch approach to analyse the effect of the hikes, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL)?s A.K. Bhargava, executive director, wireless services had announced that MTNL did not plan to follow suit.
