The Hindu : Telephone directory distribution from February 15

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jan 28, 2004

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Telephone directory distribution from February 15

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, JAN. 27. Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. (BSNL) on Tuesday released the new telephone director for Bangalore Telecom District. The directory will be distributed to the public from February 15.

The Principal General Manager, BSNL Bangalore Telecom District, B.R. Baliga, said the changeover to eight digits with the prefix "2" before all numbers in the city, which came into effect on January 24, has been incorporated in the new directory. The English version of the directory comes in three volumes and the Kannada version in four volumes. The CD-ROM version was also released on this occasion.

The GETIT Yellow Pages will be be released subsequently.

The GETIT's Corporate Vice-President, Raghavendra Shastry, said the Yellow Page business directory to be released later would have over 9,000 business entries. The district directories were being updated.

The Chief General Manager, BSNL Karnataka Circle, K. Padmanabhan, said the directory now weighed 3.37 kg. and the CD-ROM version was being offered as a more handy alternative. GETIT had brought out the directory fast enough to accommodate changes up to November 2003 and the CD version incorporated changes up to the end of December. This year also mobile distribution of the directory would be taken up if necessary, he said. "We appeal to all phone subscribers to exchange their old directories with the new ones. The paper is being recycled and we will not have to cut trees," Mr. Padmanabhan said.

Mr. Padmanabhan and Mr. Baliga told presspersons that a few exchanges, especially those with the "22" prefix were yet to change over to the eight-digit format for technical reasons.

The Bangalore Telecom District now had a subscriber base of 9.65 lakh.

"If the number of landline subscribers has not increased it is also because of improved service... offices which used to have multiple phone connections as a standby now make do with fewer connections," Mr. Baliga said.

BSNL Mobile had issued five lakh SIM cards so far and this would go up to 8.5 lakh before mid-year. There were 120 base stations now and this would increase to 300 this year. The prepaid cards were increasingly becoming popular and more would be made available this year.

The facility of Postal Department personnel carrying mobile phones to enable rural folks make phone calls had become very popular in Bangalore Rural District, Mr. Padmanabhan said. Tele density in the State now averaged 6 to 7 per 100 people.

The "95" facility of making STD calls at local rates after 10 p.m. was likely to be extended to other cities in the state.

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