GUWAHATI, Nov 4 ? Reliance Telecom Limited (RTL), the mobile phone licensee for the North-east circle, will be launching its services in Agartala town shortly. Reliance will have two service providers, M/s Air Waves and M/s Connoisseurs Technologies Pvt Ltd, who have opened customer service centres at HG Bask Road and Jagannath Bari Road respectively, an RTL press release said here.
RTL will initially offer only the Talk Light 99 tariff plan in Agartala. Due to non-receipt of point of interconnect (POI), from Agartala Tax of BSNL, all calls made from Reliance Mobile at Agartala shall be routed through its exchange at Shillong. However, Reliance will charge tariff applicable for local calls only.
Till the time BSNL issues the POI, a PSTN subscriber at Agartala has to dial a Reliance Mobile number at Agartala with a ?0? before the mobile number. As a goodwill gesture, Reliance has decided not to charge the monthly rental of Rs 99 along with service tax till the time POI is issued by BSNL. Customers will, however, enjoy all the other value added services like SMS, ring tone download, etc.
The RTL release said that it has plans to start operations in South Tripura in the second phase after the completion of all its sites in Agartala and also after receiving the necessary POI from BSNL. RTL started its GSM based cellular phone service in the North-east in 1998 with the setting up of its mobile switching centre in Shillong.
However, due to the restrictions imposed by the Central Government, plans to roll out its network to other towns of the region had to be shelved. The ban was lifted in 2003. It is important to mention that due to another restriction imposed by the Centre after January 31, 2004, only post paid subscriptions are allowed in Assam and the North-east circle. RTL will operate in Tripura with its post-paid service.