Telecom minister Kapil Sibal today reiterated that free roaming will become reality soon. With an idea of one-nation-one-number, the government’s next focus is to facilitate pan India free roaming service.
DoT chief R Chandrashekhar is working on it, Sibal said. Earlier, after the May 31 Cabinet meeting presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, he had said that affordable services, including abolishing roaming charges, were on cards.
The new National Telecom Policy 2012, which was approved by the Cabinet, promises to abolish roaming charges and relax Internet telephony rules.
The telcos are demanding redressal of certain challenges that could pave path to abolish roaming charges. These pain points, COAI believes, include inter connection-centric issues, traffic routing, tariff rebalancing, revised national numbering plan and licensing terms and conditions.
Speaking to CIOL, Telecom Commission chairman and DoT secretary R Chandrashekhar said that free roaming is expected sometime before 2014 as the process involves various procedures.
"We are going in this direction and have conveyed the matter to the government and the Cabinet,” he informed. The government, though optimistic, will soon start a dialogue with the industry.
Elaborating on the cause of delay, he said that the process includes different timelines that are dedicated to various steps involved. The provisioning time is from 6 months to 36 months, Chandrashekhar said.
Industry estimates that free roaming will impact nearly 5 to 8 per cent of subscribers only, but it could reduce revenue margins by as much as 8 to 10 per cent.
Telecom analysts feel that introduction of free roaming will help the industry, despite losses in short run, as the mobile usage would increase.
Recently, COAI director general Rajan S Mathews said that a final call on implementation of free roaming would be taken by the DoT. ''This proposal for no additional charges for roaming across the nation is complex, serious and potentially disruptive matter,'' he informed.
DoT chief R Chandrashekhar is working on it, Sibal said. Earlier, after the May 31 Cabinet meeting presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, he had said that affordable services, including abolishing roaming charges, were on cards.
The new National Telecom Policy 2012, which was approved by the Cabinet, promises to abolish roaming charges and relax Internet telephony rules.
The telcos are demanding redressal of certain challenges that could pave path to abolish roaming charges. These pain points, COAI believes, include inter connection-centric issues, traffic routing, tariff rebalancing, revised national numbering plan and licensing terms and conditions.
Speaking to CIOL, Telecom Commission chairman and DoT secretary R Chandrashekhar said that free roaming is expected sometime before 2014 as the process involves various procedures.
"We are going in this direction and have conveyed the matter to the government and the Cabinet,” he informed. The government, though optimistic, will soon start a dialogue with the industry.
Elaborating on the cause of delay, he said that the process includes different timelines that are dedicated to various steps involved. The provisioning time is from 6 months to 36 months, Chandrashekhar said.
Industry estimates that free roaming will impact nearly 5 to 8 per cent of subscribers only, but it could reduce revenue margins by as much as 8 to 10 per cent.
Telecom analysts feel that introduction of free roaming will help the industry, despite losses in short run, as the mobile usage would increase.
Recently, COAI director general Rajan S Mathews said that a final call on implementation of free roaming would be taken by the DoT. ''This proposal for no additional charges for roaming across the nation is complex, serious and potentially disruptive matter,'' he informed.