Reliance Telecom To Start Services In All Circles By July

Reliance Telecom, cellular service licence holder for seven circles, will start its cellular services in all the circles by the end of July.

Under the first phase, the services will be launched in 26 cities spread across 13 states. Later, under the second phase, the services will be extended to cover around 100 cities covering 50 per cent of the district headquarters, informed sources told Business Standard.

The services, which were supposed to have started in May, could not be started because of the delay in the ministry of finance notification pertaining to reduction of tax on telecom equipment, sources said. Reliance, which has sourced its equipment from Motorola and Ericsson, cleared its consignment from the customs, and have now made considerable progress in installing and setting up the cellular infrastructure. The department of telecommunications had contemplated slapping a fine of Rs 6 crore as liquidated damages for start-up delays.

 

Reliance Telecom, a part of Reliance Industries Ltd, has a strategic alliance with Nynex, one of the regional Bell companies which recently merged with Bell Atlantic. Nynex has a 10 per cent stake in Reliance Telecom.

Reliance has the cellular circle licence for Himachal Pradesh, West Bengal (including Sikkim), Orissa, Bihar, Assam, Madhya Pradesh and the seven north-eastern states. The 13 states covered by Reliance have a combined population of over 300 million people. The area's harsh and diverse terrain and lack of landline telephone service or low tele-density holds a lot of scope for cellular phone services. Reliance also has the licence for basic services in Gujarat.

The total licence fee of all the cellular circles work out to a whopping Rs 3,370 crore.