There's been a huge churn within the telecom sector in India over the last couple of years. These were precipitated by the laws and taxation policies in force, along with some rampant noncompetitive predatory practices, rock bottom pricing, m & a, essential upgrades to technology and infrastructure and so on, alongside a high growth of mobile phone & internet users (100+ crores) in the country.
The last factor helped bridge the connectivity and digital divide between the rural and the urban parts of the nation. Users of all age groups from all over came on board and got hooked on to social media sites and chatting apps. Online meetings, business communications, schooling, banking and payments, etc. went the mobile apps route.
While things were good for a while, a flip side to the story emerged soon. The large scale adoption was brought on by unsustainable predatory pricing by the players, esp. the new entrants. Which was closely followed by lowering of prices by the rest of the players. This race to the bottom, as expected, led to sinking of all but the most financially solvent ones. While some exited, others merged, the rest continue to struggle to stay afloat. An upward revision of prices therefore seems like the only way out of this mess.
On the other hand, a rise in prices will likely result in a drop in the number of users, particularly from the marginalized and weaker sections of the population. Perhaps a study is in order (or already done) which shows the impact per thousand (or lakh) users for every rupee (or ten) increase in prices. This mobile inclusivity for the citizens gained at long last must not be lost at any cost. Incorrect policies, corporate practices, profit motives, etc. of the past should not result in the nation regressing on the digital inclusivity front.
A sure shot Catch-22 for the policy makers from the sector:
- To save the telecom players (via upward price revisions), or
- To preserve/ promote digital inclusivity for the citizens (particularly for the vulnerable).
One option that can be considered is to relook at the telecom pricing model. Telecom players these days offer various "Unlimited Plans". These have bundled unlimited data and call time (with daily sub-limits of a few gigs, minutes, etc.). These are therefore among the most popular plans and have led to an explosion of daily usage. People no longer care about the usage, while calling or using the internet/ data packs. As a result mobile bandwidths are practically choked all through the day. Poor quality services including frequent call drops, false rings, slow data connections are a menace for everyone. Plus there is also the adverse impact on the environment due to constant energy wastage happening at the level of the devices, network, switches, mobile towers, and so on.
The telecom pricing model in the past was the much more sensible "Pay-As-You-Go" model. Just like other shared basic need utilities available in a limited supply such as water, electricity, etc. telecom bandwidth (service) should also revert to the standard pay-as-you-go. This prevents wastage and allows a much fairer distribution of constrained resources.
There is a flat/ fixed nominal monthly subscription charge, and a variable usage cost billed per unit. Additionally by having separate consumption slabs, heavy/ corporate users can be made to pay more (as per a high cost slab), while the normal/ light users allowed to pay less. Thereby, making it easy on the pocket of the normal user and yet profitable for the telecom players.
The allied benefit of pay-as-you-go pricing will be that the number of mindless forwards, fakes, misinformation/ disinformation will go down, if not entirely disappear. Most people would be averse to spending even a few rupees daily towards the barrage of forwards and fakes. Resulting in a socially better and environmentally healthier world to live in!
Finally, to ensure inclusivity for the needy segments of the society and so that nobody gets left out, a separate "Janta (Citizen) Mobile Plan" could be introduced & a direct-to-account bill subsidy constituted. These little changes along with other significant ones on the corporate policy, laws, taxation and fair trade practices sides will ensure that India regains its lost ground in the telecom sector.
