DR.SOWRI RAJAN KOMANDUR,Ph.d
Head Telecom Division, Indian Telecommns
The Indian telecom scenario has thus undergone drastic and encouraging changes within a short period for the benefit of the consumer and it can be anticipated that there are going to be even better conditions in the coming future. In this paper, the present telecom scenario and the future developments are discussed.
The tariffs in cellular, domestic long distance and now international long distances have tumbled over the past year. Competition is going to intensify further as the new entrants try to grab market share. On April2,, the last bastion of monopoly in telecommunications in international long distance telephony fell. That was the end of VSNL’s monopoly and also opening up of or legalisation of internet telephony. It is expected that this attractive segment will see a rush of companies trying to woo Indian telecom consumer. The BSNL(Govt. owned) has already announced 20 percent cut in long distance rates.
The communications industry in India will be touching about 70,000 crore Indian ruppes. It is estimated that the growth is about 15 percent over the last year.
It is explained in this papers various options available to customers in India. The various objectives of the DOT, of Govt. of India which became a corporation by name BSNL in October 2000 are discussed. Also the perfomance of other leading basic service providers like MTNL, Hughes telecom, Tata Teleservices is discussed.
Also various technology options now available in India for international connectivity services are discussed. The corporates world wide get international connectivity through international private leased circuits(IPLC), frame relay, IP-VPN and ATM. In India this was limited only to IPLC and frame relay. But now since other private operators like Bharati, reliance etc are offering services in

all segments without restricting themselves to IPLC and frame relay. All the major tier-I world carriers like cable and wireless, BT, AT&T, world com etc are providing presently services through
VSNL.
The different types of broad band equipment to provide broad band services is an important criterion. In the old days the telecommunication policy makers all the world over are worried about things like long distance, telephone calls, cost of international calls, whether everyone had a phone to make a local call. Today everyone talks about broadband. In the beginning broadband is simply highspeed access to internet. Now a days ubiquitous broadband service is the hot subject.