NASSCOM urges DoT to Simplify Licensing Norms for Call Centers

NASSCOM has submitted its recommendations to DoT in order to remove certain procedural bottlenecks that are hampering growth of the Call Centre sector. NASSCOM has also asked the DoT to review certain areas in the licensing agreement for setting up of international and domestic Call Centres in India. Submitting the recommendations, Karnik Karnik, President, NASSCOM, said "The Government has done a lot in past one year in the area of telecom liberalisation. However, there are various licensing and connectivity issues in the ITES sector, which requires policy amendments by the Government. It is imperative that the government encourages sustained growth in this the sector by streamlining procedural bottlenecks and provide a progressive policy framework to encourage investment."

"Today the licensing conditions for call centres and telecom regulations are being compared with countries like Philippines, Mexico, Ireland etc. India ranks above these countries in terms of manpower availability, however, telecom links and licensing requirements for call centres can be a stumbling block for proposed back-office investments in India" he said. 

"We have taken a holistic view of the issues related to call centre licensing in collaboration with major players in this space and have submitted our recommendations to DoT. The objective of providing these recommendations is to ensure that there is a level playing field, transparency and ease of operations in the Call Centre sector", he further added.

Highlight of Recommendations

• Allow sharing of bandwidth for disaster recovery and mission critical applications between multiple entities 
• Permit sharing of bandwidth between multiple locations of a single entity and also within the same group of companies 
• Call Center approval should not to be customer-specific 
• Allow Internet & IPLC connectivity on same LAN 
• Allow connectivity of a LAN in an international call center to a domestic ISP 
• ITES companies be allowed to set up their own gateways