Amid the growing menace of unsolicited calls and SMSes, telecom regulator TRAI on Friday declared that the services of subscribers who illegally carried on telemarketing activities would be disconnected with immediate effect. Further, such users would be blacklisted and not provided with any telecom facility for a period of two years.
“In case of a valid unsolicited commercial communication complaint, the originating access-provider shall disconnect all telecom resources allotted to [and blacklist] such subscribers, after due investigation. This provision comes into force with immediate effect,” TRAI member R.K. Arnold told reporters here.
“Upon entry in the blacklist, all access-providers shall disconnect the telecom resources provided by it to such subscriber within twenty-four hours,” Mr. Arnold said.
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This provision will come into force in 30 days time.
These provisions are part of ‘The Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference (12th amendment) Regulations 2013’, which the TRAI has introduced to further strengthen the framework for controlling unregistered telemarketers.
“...there are many private persons who are sending commercial messages to subscribers... now with this particular amendment... the resources of such subscribers will be disconnected,” Mr. Arnold said.
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Meanwhile, the TRAI has also amended the Telecom Commercial Customer Preference Regulations, 2010, which prescribes a fee of 5 paise per transactional SMS and will come into effect from June 1.
“The 5-paise charge is already there for promotional messages. Now, it will be applicable for transactional messages also, which also falls under the category of commercial communications,” Mr. Arnold said.
Besides, the telecom authority said it had introduced the Short Message Services Termination Charges Regulations, 2013, which prescribe a termination charge of 2 paise per SMS.
The regulations would come into effect from June 1.