BANGALORE: BSNL Bangalore Telecom will in a week start selling prepaid SIM cards to those who have registered at normal rates.

The announcement came on Saturday when BSNL completed five years of operations.

Bangalore Telecom Principal General Manager A.K. Arnold said: "Those who registered between September 19 and 21 will get the cards first. This is part of the expansion of our mobile network, made possible by making operational 270 base stations in and around the city."

BSNL is planning 300 more towers, to be operational by December, and coverage would improve, he said. More mobile connections would also become possible.

Asked about "gaps" in getting signals, Mr. Arnold said: "we will be using advanced equipment to boost network coverage and the city and suburbs should have full coverage now."

Deadline

The multi-purpose payment centres, Bangalore One, would now start accepting mobile phone bill payments. The deadline for recharge coupons had been reduced to seven days from the expiry of talk time.

For the Dasara festival season, there would be no activation charges for new postpaid mobile connection; this offer would end on October 15.

This would be applicable to all existing tariff plans. Postpaid subscribers would have a new tariff plan now: Plan 100 specially for government employees and staff of public sectors units, who pay a monthly rental of Rs. 100 with calls within BSNL mobile network would be charged Re. 1 per minute and calls to other telecom circles would cost Rs. 1.80 per minute.

Calls to other mobile networks would be charged Rs. 2.40. Registration for Plan 100 is till November-end.

ISO certification

Bangalore Telecom has a feather in its cap; it has been certified ISO 9001:2000 for maintaining consistent quality in services, including its rural operations.

"We are the only telecom district in the country to have got this certification," Mr. Arnold said.

BSNL had commissioned a Mobile Switching Centre based on CDMA-WLL at Whitefield to increase coverage in Bangalore Rural District. This district would have 17 more towers to enhance coverage, he said.

Throughout Karnataka more base stations were being installed; there were 700 now and the number would go up to 1,000 by December. The number of mobile subscribers through BSNL in the State was expected to increase to 22 lakh, he said.

New tariff plans

For landline users, two new tariff plans have been announced. Budget 299 would get 150 free calls with a monthly rental of Rs. 299. Calls above the free limit would be charged Rs. 1.20 per unit. The other plan was Elite, with a monthly rental of Rs. 1,450 and 1,800 free calls, calls above the limit would be charged 90 paise per unit. About providing "feature phones," the procurement plans were still on, Mr. Arnold said.

The DataOne broadband services with 30,000 connections in Bangalore is to have wireless convenience soon. BSNL is now working out the technical requirements.

Forty `hot spots' had been selected in the city for providing `wi-fi,' 10 in the Whitefield area dominated by the IT industry.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail