Challenges Of Telecommunication

INTRODUCTION

India’s telecommunication is the second largest in the world based on the total number of telephone users both fixed and mobile phone. Indian telecom sector is more than 165 years old. Telecommunications was first introduced in India in 1851 when the first operational land lines were laid by the government near Kolkata (then Calcutta), although telephone services were formally introduced in India much later in 1881. Further, in 1883, telephone services were merged with the postal system. In 1947, after India attained independence, all foreign telecommunication companies were nationalised to form the Posts, Telephone and Telegraph (PTT), a body that was governed by the Ministry of Communication. The Indian telecom sector was entirely

It helps both the socio economic and also technological development of the country. Still it faces certain kind of challenges and issues in its way of further development, which may become hurdles in its way of expansion. This work is going through the major challenges facing by the Indiab telecom industry today. The information collected from various journals and publications of the ministry of telecommunication and also the data published by the Telecom Authority Regulatory of India. OBJECTIVES

• To understand the Indian telecommunication industry and its major developments.

• To Analyse and evaluate the major issues and challenges of Indian telecommunication industry.

• To provide suggestions for the problems in telecommunication industry.

Challenges of Indian Telecom Industry.

Telecom industry witnessed revolutionary changes in recent years. Indian telecom industry is the fastest growing industry in Indian economy. It has one of the lowest call tariffs in the world enabled by the mega telephone networks and hyper-competition among them. On the basis of data as on 2013 the telecom subscriber’s details are shown in the table, which explains the current status of Indian telecom industry.

Table 1.1 Trends in Indian Telecommunication Industry Quarter ending December 2011 Quarter ending March 2012

Telecom subscribers (wireless and wire line)in million

Total telephone subscribers 926.53 951.34

In each circle there are around 9-10 operators competing for the same revenue pie which is not growing. Lower tariff and high introductory offers which the industry saw during 2009 resulted in multiple SIM ownership and reduced realization per minute of use. The new operators who entered the market during 2009 offered subscriptions at throw away prices loaded with free talk time. The incumbent operators are also forced to get into this tariff war and this converted the existing paying minutes to non paying minutes and slowed down the revenue growth of the sector. During 2012 the growth in subscriber base resulted in an increase in the gross revenue of telecom services from Rs.1, 71,719 crore to Rs.1, 95,442 crore during the year, a growth of