Avail free roaming from next month

BANGALORE, INDIA: The free roaming facility, announced a few days ago by the Union Minister for Communications and IT, Kapil Sibal, is going to be a reality from this July.

With free roaming and other consumer-centric initiatives, Sibal bats for affordability as the core of the new policy, which may have a few ramifications on service providers' revenues. But it is said that increased usage will suffice their apparent loss.

Surprisingly, the state-owned BSNL has already dropped roaming charges on one of its prepaid plans. Similarly, private player Airtel has started a campaign in the Mumbai-Gujarat Highway and put up advertisement hoardings about free roaming between these circles.

Airtel's free roaming ad gains significance at a time when newspapers are abuzz with the reports, which say Indian telecom service providers might resist the government move to push for free roaming scheme, as it would adversely affect their revenues.

Almost all the telecom companies today charge Re. 1 per call for roaming. The new regulation would, however, put an end to the consumer's roaming woes.