Number portability within a year, says Behura

Mobile Number Portability (MNP) service will be launched across the country within one year as the Department of Telecom (DoT) has already issued licences to two global companies for implementing the service, a senior government official said today.

"MNP service will be introduced within one year across the country," Telecom Secretary Siddhartha Behura told reporters here today.

He said licences for implementing MNP service had already been issued to two US-based companies. "While the name of one company is Telecordia Technologies, the name of the other one I can't recall...," he said.

Behura, who was here in connection with the launch of BSNL's Blackberry services, further said that within six months, MNP would be introduced in four metro cities and thereafter, the rest of the country would be covered.

With the launch of MNP service, mobile customers would be able to change their telecom operators while retaining their mobile phone number after paying some charge.

On whether DoT asked BSNL to stop launching 3G services till the security agencies had the monitoring system in place, Behura replied in negative. "DoT never asked BSNL to stop rolling out 3G services and they (BSNL) can go as per their plan to launch 3G services," he said.