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Highlights |
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No change in rentals for rural areas.
* No change in the monthly rental for commercial subscribers in the urban areas.
* Free calls halved to 30 in urban areas. While in rural areas it has been reduced to 50 from existing level of 75.
* Call duration of local call has been reduced to two minutes from three minutes both for urban and rural areas.
* Calls up to 300 would be billed at rate of Re 1. Earlier call up to 500 were billed at Re 1 in urban areas. While beyond 300 call the applicable rate will Rs 1.20 per call.
* No change in monthly rental for senior citizens.
* All kinds of incoming calls on cellular phones become free with no additional charges. |
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New Delhi, January 25
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) today redefined the rules of the ongoing tariff war by effectively doubling the fixed line local call charges in urban areas while making all incoming calls free on cellular phones from April 1, 2003, through a multi-structured interconnect regime.
The rental on basic telephones have been increased to Rs 280 per month from the existing Rs 250 per month for urban areas where the capacity is more than one lakh connections per month.
The pulse rate has been decreased to two minutes per call from the existing level of three minutes, while the number of free calls have been halved to 30 a month from the existing 60 metered calls a month. In rural areas, the number of free calls have been reduced to 50 a month from 75 per month as is applicable presently.
The new rates will be applicable from April 1, 2003.
The local call charges have also been upwardly revised and has been fixed at Re 1 for two minutes ( Rs 0.50 per minute) after free calls up to 300 metered calls — up from Re 1 for three minutes (Rs 0.33 per minute) after free calls
upto
500 metered calls.For calls beyond 300 metered calls, subscribers will be charged at the rate of Rs 1.20 per two minutes (Rs 0.60 per minute) — up from the existing Rs 1.20 per three minutes ( Rs 0.40 per minute) for calls beyond 500 metered calls.
The rental for land lines falling under semi-urban areas with capacity of 30,000 to 99,999 has been increased to Rs 200 from Rs 180, while those in smaller exchanges remain unchanged at Rs 120 per month.
In the rural areas, there will be no change in the monthly rental and will remain unchanged at Rs 70 and Rs 120 depending upon the capacity of the telephone exchange.
Fixed line subscribers in rural areas will be charged at the rate of Rs 0.80 per two minutes (Rs 0.40 per minute) after free calls up to 300 metered calls — up from the existing Rs 0.80 per minutes (Rs 0.26 per minute) after free calls up to 500 metered calls. For calls beyond 500 metred calls the local rates have been fixed at Rs 1.20 per two minutes as against Rs 1.20 per three minutes under the existing structure.
There will be no change in rentals for senior citizens in both urban and rural areas. Urban commercial subscribers will be charged at the rate of Rs 310 per month for large exchanges and Rs 220 per month for smaller exchanges.
For domestic long distance calls ( STD calls) TRAI has given the flexibility to the individual operator to decide on the tariff with an upper ceiling of Rs 8.40 per minute for distances beyond 50 km.
For distances up to 50 km call charges will be the same as for local calls.
Even for international long distance calls (ISD), operators would have freedom to determine the tariffs.
TRAI has also given the freedom to fix the rates of local calls for WLL (M) phones. Presently, WLL (M) operators are mandatorily required to charge at the Rs 1.20 per three minutes. All incoming calls will, however, continue to remain free on WLL (M) phones.
On the contentious issue of interconnect charges, TRAI has a fixed the rate at Rs 0.30 for calls originating from a WLL (M) phone and terminating at a cellular phone. In other words, a WLL (M) operator has to a Rs 0.30 per minute for a call made from its service to a cellular network in any metro circle and vice versa.
Subscribers, however, will be charged at the rate of Rs 1.20 per two minutes i.e. Rs 0.80 per minute for calls made from fixed to cellular mobile phones.
In non-metro circles, subscribers will be charged at the rate of Rs 1.20 per minute for calls from a fixed line to a cellular phone.
TRAI Chairman M S Verma said with the new interconnection charges all incoming calls on mobile phones would be free without any additional charge. "Any charge on incoming calls will be invalid", he said.
In a metro circle, a fixed line operators has to pay the cellular operator at the rate of Rs 0.30 per minute for a call terminating at a cellular network, while a cellular operator has to pay at the rate of Rs 0.50 per minute for call made from its service to a fixed line phone.
Similarly, while a fixed line operator will pay Rs 0.30 per minute to a WLL ( M) operator for terminating a call, the WLL (M) operator will pay the Rs 0.50 per minute as termination charges to a fixed line operators in a metro circle.
In both metro and non-metro circles, TRAI has given the freedom to both cellular and WLL (M) operators to fix the tariff for calls made to fixed line networks.
In a non-metro circle fixed line operator has to pay Rs 0.40 per minute to a cellular operator as termination charges, while the cellular operator will pay Rs 0.60 per minute for getting through to a fixed line. A WLL (M) and cellular operator will both pay Rs 0.40 per minute for terminating calls in each other’s network.
