Monday, January 13, 2003		Feature

Cellphones zaroorat sabhi ki
Sumeet Chatterjee

HOUSEWIFE Radhika Sood in the hill town of Shimla loves the mobile phone, and for good reason. "Our teenaged children remain away for most of the year," Sood says. "But I hardly miss them since I frequently talk to them on the SMS service."

Far away, in the Indian capital, schoolteacher Ranjini Narayan has seen her life change ever since she bought a mobile telephone about a year ago.

"I did not want it initially," she said. "But now that I have it, I wonder how I spent all these years without a mobile phone! I can be reached anytime and anywhere, and that gives me a great feeling of security."

For a variety of reasons, from the very personal to business, Indians cutting across age, profession and status are increasingly going in for the mobile phone with a zeal that has heralded a communication revolution.

Today, in places like Delhi, no one gives a second glance when a mobile phone rings in a bus. A gadget that until a few years ago seemed to be a status symbol is suddenly on its way to becoming a near necessity.

"Mobile phones have finally penetrated the entire nation," Fausto Cardoso, president and CEO of BPL Mobile, a cellular service provider, told IANS. "India is really ready for accelerated growth in the year ahead.

"Today we have 37 million fixed-line and 10 million mobile phone subscribers in India. In a few years the equation will change dramatically and mobiles will become the preferred choice of communication for most Indians.

"Even rural areas, where fixed-line services are not feasible, are taking to mobile phones in a big way, which is fantastic," he said. "You are soon going to find practically everybody will have mobile phone."

Cardoso’s prophecy may already be happening, at least in metropolitan India.

Now people can be seen talking on mobile phones while walking down the street, or on subways, on trains, in offices, buses, in marketplaces and even in schools as well as colleges.

Says an irate teacher with a privately-run management training institute: "I warn students that I will deduct marks from their end term papers if their phone rings during a class."

Although the 10.5 million mobile phones may look measly in a country of one billion people, industry experts say a revolution is in the making and the users are forecast to grow to 30.9 million by 2005.

That would make India the third largest cellular market in Asia, after China and Japan.

"The mobile revolution has affected our lives so much," said Rudra Basu, a Kolkata-based market researcher with research firm ORG-MARG. "There’s no missing each other with a mobile in hand." Agrees Rajesh Vishwakarma, a carpenter in Mumbai, the country’s financial capital: "I use a mobile with a prepaid card only so that clients can contact me anytime, anywhere. This has resulted in more business for me."

At the wholesale vegetable market in New Delhi’s southern fringe of Okhla, there is a steady ringing of mobile phones. Even as they finalise deals, the sellers are already in touch with other wholesale markets in the city.

One trader, Govind Saran, says since he acquired the mobile service more than six months ago, his profits have doubled. "Today life without a mobile phone is unimaginable for me," he said.

"This has not only helped me on the business front, I can also keep in touch with my family when I am out for long hours," said Saran, who travels to Delhi every day from Sohna in the neighbouring state of Haryana.

Today, in major cities, even taxi drivers, plumbers, construction workers and small traders are switching over the pager to mobile phones.

Industry observers say a growing economy; a strong middle-class and the increasing affordability of mobile phones have contributed to the cellular boom in India.

A sharp plunge in the price of handsets has also fuelled stronger growth. Most models are available for Rs.3,500 to Rs.8,000 now, down from Rs.12,000-Rs.18,000 until recently. "It’s a tariff and competition driven growth," T.V. Ramachandran, director general of Cellular Operators Association of India, the umbrella association of the mobile telephony service providers in the country, told IANS. "The actual tariffs being charged by operators are sharply lower and therefore the service providers are getting more customers," he added.

The airtime tariff charged by cellular operators have dropped from Rs.4.50 a minute in 2000 to a rupee a minute on an average for an outgoing call, making it the lowest in the world.

And with the rising popularity, marketing of mobile phones and "pre-paid cards" has become fierce and flexible.

Said Rajiv Chauhan, who owns an apple orchard in Himachal Pradesh: "My landline number was perpetually out of the order and my work suffered because of this. All that has changed since I procured a mobile connection."