Will 100 SMS limit curb pesky calls?

Finally, millions of mobile subscribers across the country will get a sigh of relief from all those pesky commercial calls and messages, as the new strict regulations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to check pesky calls have come into effect.

On September 27, Trai came out with recommendations to stop pesky calls and text messages. According to these recommendations, none of the service providers operators shall permit the transmission of more than 100 SMSes per day per SIM. In the case of postpaid phone numbers, the access provider shall not permit more than 3,000 SMSes per SIM per month.

As per the new guidelines, a user can opt for a 'fully blocked' category whereupon all commercial calls/SMSes will be blocked, while there is a 'partially blocked' category to receive various promotional SMSes. The new regulations have provisions of hefty penalty of up to Rs 2.50 lakh on erring telemarketing companies and blacklisting of habitual offenders. The regulations also mandate that no commercial communication, even for unregistered customers, shall be sent between 9.00 pm and 9.00 am, so that customers are not disturbed at night.

Though Trai has exempted various service providers, including the dealers of telecom operators, e-ticketing agencies, and social networking sites, from the new limit of 100 SMSes per day per SIM. The directive from the telecom regulator had come in the wake of concerns raised by telecom lobby COAI on limiting the SMSes entitlement per SIM to 100 per day.

However the policy doesn't seem to be as appealing as it seems to be at the superficial level and comes with pros and cons attached to it.

The brunt would be felt by a large section of the society, ie, the telemarketers, banking sectors, hospitals, schools, and many more that would in turn affect the common man at large as it's they who would be deprived of the all these bulk, but at times necessary, SMSes.

Moreover, the current policy still doesn't satisfy the customer as there is no place where they can call and register a complain. A telemarketer or commercial institutions can still send those pesky SMSes by opting for more then 3-4 SIMs on an average and with SMS packs. This would in turn increase a misleading statistics to the subscriber base of the country. As these 2 or 3 SIM cards are all subscriptions, ie, mobile numbers, which is is not the same thing as distinct users, ie, the subscriber base.

However limiting the 100 SMSes does not seem to suffice all the categories of commercial establishment, therefore the need of the hour is that Trai should modify the existing norm and come with a policy that would be in interest of one and all.