India’s fourth largest mobile service provider Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), will slash fixed-line domestic call rates by up to half from Wednesday, as reported earlier by FE. Calls made by landline and wireless customers in local loop services will be slashed by 50%, while those made using cellular networks would be cheaper by 40-50%, BSNL chairman and managing director, Kuldeep Goyal, announced on Monday.

Goyal said, ?This development happened late because we were not in a position to slash rates earlier.? He added, ?Now that we have cheaper STD rates, it is for others to follow.?

The state-run BSNL had a combined subscriber base of 725 lakh at the end of April, out of 3,085 lakh telephone connections nationwide. STD calls from landlines will be charged at Rs 1.20 per minute from the current rate of Rs 2.40 to all networks in general. For its rural subscribers the company has slashed the rates to as low as 0.80 paise per minute. The company has reduced the national roaming charges to Re1 per minute, matching that of its competitors in the market.

While the One India Plan had been revised fromm Rs 799 to Rs 299. The company also launched a new scheme, where a customer will be able to choose an intercircle and intracircle number, for which the charge will be only 20 paise per minute.

He also added that the company was talking to a couple of consortiums. Earlier this year, Bharti Airtel was the first to slash the STD rates to Rs 1.50 for pre-paid as well as postpaid customers. Reliance Communications, the country; s second largest service provider then followed with unlimited free STD calls for all existing and new subscribers in post-paid, pre-paid and hello fixed wireless phone connections.. Vodafone Essar then cut its STD calls to Rs 1.30 and the AV Birla Group?s Idea Cellular brought tariffs down to the same amount.

On expansion plans, Goyal said that the company had already ordered 250 lakh lines as part of its expansion project, and would start growing in all the circles it operates in from July. Fifty lakh lines each have been ordered for the Northern, Southern and Eastern regions, while the company ordered ninety lakh subscribers for the Western region.