Storming his way into the telecom industry, RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani announced free voice calls and free national roaming along with rock- bottom data prices on his new Reliance Jio network early this month. And any such decision by BSNL will further put pressure on Airtel, Vodafone, and Idea to slash tariffs.
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The public sector player is planning to follow Jio in offering free voice calling on its network, and at plans that will be cheaper than the new entrant’s.
BSNL’s chief said that his company will be keeping an eye on the response that Jio 4G receives, and then decide on its own plans. BSNL came forward to compete with Reliance Jio and made a decision to offer free voice calling to its customers.
He said that BSNL plans to be even lower than the Jio plan, and this could be by Rs 2-4. According to BSNL sources, the new zero-voice-tariff plans will be applicable from January 2016. Shrivastava said that the plan will be offered to BSNL’s mobile customers who also have a broadband connection at home.
The main aim of the company is to force consumers to make use of the home broadband to route outgoing mobile calls via the landline network. However, its services are absent in key markets such as Delhi and Mumbai, which is serviced by MTNL. The state-run operator has a strong market penetration in key states such as Odisha, Punjab, UP, Kerala, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh.
However, free calls could also be made when people leave their homes.
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While market analysts believe this move could hit the revenue of BSNL, the company is hoping to reconcile it with new customer additions.
