Letters: GPRS bill bytes

All mobile operators in India charge around 10 paise per 10kb — that’s Rs 10 per Mb or Rs 10,000 per Gb — for their GPRS services which operate at around 30-40 kilobits per second. On the other hand, at 2 Mbps speed, broadband charges are around Rs 200 per Gb. Can the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India explain why this 50-fold difference is being allowed? Though the value proposition is different for landline and mobile services, there can be no justification for such a huge disparity in rates. Pay-as-you-use GPRS should be charged at no more than 4-5 paise per 100kb.

Similarly, even the Evolution-Data Optimised or EVDO-based tariffs are being kept high. Global wholesale bandwidth rates are about Rs 5-10 per Gb and considering spectrum, taxes and other capex costs, entry-level mobile internet offering should not exceed Rs100 per Gb, with the rates decreasing with increasing usage.

T Sandhya, on email