STD, ISD calls to cost less from March

NEW DELHI: Telecom regulator TRAI today announced a substantial cut in the levy paid by private operators to BSNL and fixed it at 1.5 percent of the adjusted gross revenue, which also includes revenues from international calls.

This regulation, effective from March 1, 2006, would reduce both STD and ISD tariffs.

The regulator has reduced the carriage charges for STD calls by 50 percent. In case of International Long Distance calls (ISD), TRAI has decided to apply the Access Deficit Charge (ADC) on per call basis.

Every incoming ISD call would now fetch an ADC of Rs 1.60 a minute, while outgoing call would give Rs 0.80 per minute.

The regulator also announced that there would not be any ADC on per minute basis on domestic calls.

ADC is the levy paid by private operators to BSNL, which at present stands at Rs 5,340 crore per year. The BSNL has cut this by a whopping Rs 2,000 crore annually.

However, the new ADC policy has urged for strengthening of monitoring mechanism of payment and receipt of ADC by operators.

While expressing his views on the new ADC regime, managing director Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited, R.S.P. Sinha welcomed the initiative of the regulator.

He said that this would make a positive impact on the growing telecom sector of the country.

However, the PSUs, MTNL and BSNL, have already announced STD calls at Re 1 across the country from March 1.

TRAI has reiterated that ADC would come down to zero by 2008-09 and keeping this in mind the ADC amount has been reduced by one-third of the existing sum.