Telecom stocks edge lower on Trai move

MUMBAI: Telecom stocks saw selling pressure today as regulator Trai removed charges that a landline service provider has to pay to other service providers for transmitting its customers' phone calls.

Shares of Reliance Communications fell by 2.14 per cent, Idea Cellular was down 1.94 per cent and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd lost 1.53 per cent on the BSE.

Tata Teleservices went down by 1.46 per cent and Bharti Airtel fell by 1.01 per cent.

In a bid to boost fixed line phone connections in the country, telecom regulator Trai had yesterday removed charges that a landline service provider has to pay to the other service providers for transmitting its customers' phone calls - a move that is likely to lead to lower tariffs.

Now, calls made from landline-to-landline or landline-to- mobiles will not include the interconnection charge, which was 20 paise.

Trai has also reduced network interconnection usage charges (IUC) on calls made from mobile phones by about 30 per cent to 14 paise per call from 20 paise earlier.

BSNL dominates landline phone connections with 62.71 per cent market share followed by MTNL 13.04 per cent, Bharti Airtel 12.55 per cent, Tata Teleservices 5.98 per cent and Reliance Communications 4.39 per cent.