Fixed-To-Cellular Call Tariff Hike Flayed
Cellular operators have criticised the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) decision to go ahead with an increase in tariffs for calls made from fixed telecom networks to cellular phones. The Rs 28 tariff for a three-minute call has come into effect from today.
The Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) has written to Union communications minister Beni Prasad Verma seeking an immediate audience to discuss the matter fully, a press release said. The association has also written to finance minister P Chidambaram and the Prime Ministers Office, the press release added.
A petition of the COAI challenging the new tariff will come up for hearing before a division bench of the Delhi high court on Monday. According to the press release, several consumer groups across the country have also begun approaching courts.
The association has also criticised a DoT statement that high tariffs for calls from fixed networks to cellular phones are prevalent in other countries.
The principle followed in some of the foreign countries is that the calling party pays all the charges and there is revenue sharing between the public switched telephone network and cellular operators, the press release adds.
The association said it is of the strong opinion that this unilateral imposition of very high tariffs on fixed subscribers when they call mobile numbers will have a serious impact on the viability of the state cellular projects, which are still at a nascent stage.
The association claimed that the move to increase fixed-to-cellular tariffs would, in some cases, make calling a mobile subscriber several times more expensive than even national long-distance calls. The COAI is of the unanimous and strong opinion that decisions with such far-reaching impact should be made only after taking the industry into confidence, adds the press release.
DoT had decided on January 29 to impose a Rs 28 per three-minute-call tariff as different from the Rs 1.25-per-call at present with effect from February 15. The department yesterday reiterated its decision to bring the new tariffs into effect as initially planned.
The decision to hike tariffs came as a bolt from the blue for all cellular operators. It upset business plans and valuations since 40-50 per cent of revenues was expected to come from calls made from the basic telecom network to cellular subscribers.