Jio, Airtel and Vi Don’t Want Users to Cheapen Out

Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea (Vi) have opposed the view that standalone voice and SMS plans should exist. This view came from the telecom regulatory authority of India (TRAI). Consumers have been continuously saying that they want plans with just voice, and just SMS, and these plans should be cheaper. While such plans do exist, they aren’t enough for most consumers. The telcos only brought the voice only plans because TRAI mandated one such plan should be offered by every company.

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Key Highlights

  • Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and Vodafone Idea have opposed the idea of more standalone voice and SMS-only plans.
  • The proposal for additional voice-only plans was discussed by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.
  • Telecom operators argue that voice services today run over data networks, making separation impractical.
  • Consumer groups say 250–300 million feature phone users are forced to pay for data they do not use.
  • TRAI has not yet issued a final decision on the matter.

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However, the telcos have no intent on bringing more such plans. Consumers in India already enjoy data at a much lower cost than consumers in other countries. However, if we are comparing, then telcos in other countries also in general offer better coverage than the three private telecom operators in the country.

Jio, Airtel and Vi have strongly said to no the arrival of prepaid plans with SMS and voice only benefits any further. However, there is a segment of consumers, such as people in their old age, and then people in low-income and rural surroundings, who can’t pay for the prepaid plans of the telcos when they are bundling data when this particular segment of consumers don’t even want it.