MTNL is all set to launch a free roaming scheme for its customers, enabling them to receive calls without cost while traveling across India. The telecom operator currently provides its services in New Delhi and Mumbai.
Till now, all MTNL customers had to shell out roaming charges for the calls they got when venturing outside of Mumbai and New Delhi. Government-backed BSNL had started its own free roaming plan a few months ago. The company’s Chairman Anupam Shrivastava previously claimed that the introduction of the initiative was helping it to gain consumers.
MTNL is probably hoping making incoming calls free when traveling helps it to entice more customers as well. In an interview with PTI, MTNL Chairman and Managing Director N K Yadav said that the free roaming initiative will be announced soon. The network provider is apparently in the process of finalizing the dates.
In further confirmation of the scheme, Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad supposedly told Members of Parliament (MPs) during a meeting of a consultative committee under the Ministry of Communication and IT that MTNL is in the process of introducing free roaming soon. The plan has been in the making for a long time at this point.
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To recall, the government had declared free nation-wide incoming calls as its target under the National Telecom Policy 2012. The plan was supposed to be attained gradually, with BSNL announcing free roaming for its user base only in June this year.
State-run MTNL recently upped the minimum broadband speed to 2Mbps for all its consumers and is further offering free data connectivity for 1 month to all its landline customers.