The Economic Times, Dec 21 2000

Vivek Law. MUMBAI

WHEN a village sarpanch wrote to one of India's cellular czars about

how his village was grateful for being connected — this village had

only one PCO and now there are 8 mobile phone PCOs — it was a wake up

call for the cell phone industry.

Operators across the country are seeing more than 50 per cent of all

incremental growth in cellular business coming from small towns and

rural areas.

And we are not talking about the now legendary mobile-toting rich

farmers atop tractors. The cellular has reached the man on the cycle,

the fisherman and the village sarpanch in not so prosperous villages

and towns.

Marketing strategies are therefore being reworked, tariff plans are

being redrawn and there is a sudden glint in the eyes of cellular

industry chieftains. So much so, that some operators say they do not

even need to explain in detail what a cellular phone is. The

villagers know it. It's just that we did not, they say.

"This just amazes me. From Gondia to Latur, everybody wants to be

impacted by technology. We receive letters from village sarpanch's on

how the mobile phone is being used effectively in villages where

there was a single PCO which too often never worked," says Rajeev

Chandrasekhar, chairman and chief executive officer of BPL’s

Innovision group.

Some figures. "Out of 5,40,000 total subscribers, we now have close

to 2,00,000 subscribers in small markets across Maharashtra, Kerala

and Tamil Nadu. Out of 204 towns outside Mumbai that we are present

in, 160 are small towns and villages," says Chandrasekhar.

"The growth here is going to be far more, for unlike in the metros,

the roll out in state circles has been far slower. It's only now that

operators are rolling out networks across states. You can imagine the

growth potential," he adds.

Bharti's head of mobile operations across circles, Anil Nair has an

interesting story to tell. "Look at even Delhi. We have seen

carpenters and small time contractors on bicycles among our mobile

users. There was this carpenter we were trying to hire and he gave us

a cell number to get in touch with. More importantly, a small

contractor sees value as he can call someone for more material from

the site itself," says Nair.

He has figures to show as well. In Himachal Pradesh, more than 50 per

cent of the total 8,500 subscriber base is now from areas apart from

the two main towns, Shimla and Kullu-Manali. "It's a hit in orchards.

As it is easier to create more footprints by placing a base station

on the top of a hill," he said.

Connecting people. From country roads to city slickers, you bet.