DARE - Because Entrepreneurs Do

To avoid misuse of phone connections

In a letter to the Secretary, Department of Telecommunications, CII recommended DOT to use Post Offices for issuing a mobile user card to every individual and have traceability of customer, its address verified once to avoid misuse of phone connections by anti social elements and terrorists.

In India, we are adding on an average 8 million new Phone customers every month. It is very difficult for the operators to keep track of authenticity of sale of such a large number of connections spread over length and breath of the country. Additionally, it is almost impossible to ensure safe storage of Customer Application Forms (CAF), which today considering the churn customers and active 330 Mn customers would add up to be more than 100 Crores in numbers till date.

Similarly, the customer acquisition process has undergone considerable changes either because of the market forces or directive from government. Earlier there was no standard format for CAF. Due to this reason, Government came out with a format with mandatory fields and documents relating to Proof of address and Identity. This list was revised from time to time keeping in view the industry requirement coupled with security concerns.

Keeping in mind, the security aspects, CII recommends that the Department of Telecommunications should mandate Post Offices for issuing a Phone User Card to authentic persons/ subscribers who wish to get authorized for buying the new connection(s). P&T has excellent presence across India. There are about 155,516 post offices in India. Each post office caters to population of 7,046 persons and serves an area of 21.10 sq km with average distance to be traveled for postal facilities is 2.5 km. Out of these approximately, 1,00,000 are villages. Post offices that are manned by EBDO (Extra Departmental Offices) EBDOs are already channelised for disbursement of old age pension and wages under the NREGS. With some training these functionaries will be in a position to undertake basic documentation for the each customers.

Thus, keeping in view the reach of post office in rural areas and small towns in the country, it is suggested that DoT engages post office I EBDOs for desired documentation for provisioning of phone connections through authentication process for each person wishing to become subscriber. In this regard, CII suggests that when a new customer wants to purchase a new phone connection, he will approach once in the life time, the nearest post office with all his relevant documents (proof of Identity and address). The same will be verified by the Post office, who in turn will issue Phone User Number (unique to each new Phone connection) to the said customer. This copy of MUN duly attested by himself will be carried by the customer to the nearest point of sale, based on which a new connection will be issued to the customer. The post office may like to charge a nominal fee (that may be reasonable determined by the department say Rs 25/- to Rs 50/-) per MUN for each customer. Also, the details of MUN will be put by P&T department on website, which should be possible for respective customer to open through password protection which shall be issued first time by P&T and then issued if lost on chargeable basis (Rs.25). The operator should be obliged to update the P&T website for each of the Phone / phone number issued against the MUN.

Source: Vaishnavi Corporate Communications 

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