Business & Economy

Overseas calls to be
cheaper from Feb 1 

What is India News Service, Friday, 7 January 2005, 1400 hrs IST

The stage is set for cheaper STD and ILD calls from February, with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India slashing access deficit charges for both long-distance and international calls.

The ADC rate reduction in STD calls is in the range of 40-62.5% and that on international long distance (ILD) calls is 41% for outgoing calls and 23.5% for incoming calls. The new rates will be effective from February 1.

Major private cellular operators including Bharti Tele-Ventures, Hutch and BPL said they will pass on the benefits of lower ADC rate to their subscribers. Bharti group chairman and managing director Sunil Mittal said, \93We will pass on 100% benefits to all our users from February 1. This (new ADC rates) is a good start and we have a long way to go.\94

According to Trai, the new ADC rate per minute on all inter-circle domestic calls will be uniform at 30 paise a minute. At present, the existing ADC rate is 50 paise for calls within 50-200 km and 80 paise a minute for calls beyond 200 km. The ADC for calls made within 50 km will remain at 30 paise.

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RIL board meet may take issues of warring brothers: Amid unconfirmed media reports that the Ambani brothers have agreed to a \91legal split\92 to put an end to their battle for the control of Reliance empire, the board of directors of the group's flagship company RIL has been summoned to meet on January 21.

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White sugar to be imported if price hike continues: In a move to control the rising prices of sugar in the country, the government today announced several measures and warned sugar mills and traders of action if they did not accelerate the supply of stocks in the market to bring down prices.