In a written communication to the Rajya Sabha, Milind Deora, Minister of State for Communication and Information Technology has stated that as of January 31, 2014, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has disconnected 1.4 million mobile connections of unregistered telemarketers and blacklisted about 0.18 million unregistered telemarketers for two years for sending consumers unsolicited communication messages.
Deora has further stated that the TRAI has laid down a revised framework for addressing unsolicited commercial communications (UCC). These regulations came into force with effect from September 27, 2011. As per the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulation, 2010, the National Do Not Call Registry has been renamed National Customer Preference Register (NCPR). The telemarketers after obtaining registration from TRAI are allowed to access the NCPR.
Following the introduction of UCC, the regulator has also issued various amendments to these regulations to make the framework more effective. According to the minister, TRAI?s regulatory interventions have largely curtailed threats from UCC (SMSes or calls), however the regulatory authority has not been able to fully stop unauthorised communication from non-registered telemarketers.
Deora underlined that the TRAI has been taking various steps to prevent unregistered telemarketers from sending UCC to customers registered in NCPR. These measures include putting in place a price restraint on sending of more than one hundred SMS per day per SIM, mandating operators to put in place a solution, which will ensure that no commercial SMSes are sent having same or similar characters from any number.
Deora concluded that with the implementation of these measures the number of complaints regarding receipt of UCC from unregistered telemarketers has declined from about 45,000 per month in August 2012 to about 12,000 per month in January 2014.
