Are Your Airtel Postpaid Bills And Prepaid Recharges About To Get A Lot More Expensive?

Are we about to see the end of a great run of affordable tariffs for Airtel mobile users? If we are to believe the hints over the past week or so, Bharti Airtel could look at hiking tariffs in the coming weeks and months. At a book launch this week, Bharti Airtel founder and chairman has said as much. Subscribers should ‘prepare to pay a lot more’ or get significantly less data, for instance, for the monthly bills they pay and the prepaid recharge they do, at this time. Earlier, Mittal had also shared fears that the telecom Industry in India may be reduced to two players if the third player doesn’t infuse fresh capital, without naming Vodafone Idea. At this time, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea are embroiled in a legal battle with the government over the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) issue.

India has one of the most affordable tariffs for mobile users, anywhere in the world. If we are to look at the impact of a potential, we have to perhaps understand what Mittal said about data tariffs. “You either consume 1.6GB of capacity per month either at this price point (₹160) or you may prepare to pay a lot more. We are not wanting $50-60 like the US or Europe but certainly $2 for 16 GB per month is not sustainable,” he said. His reference is to the calculation that for Rs 160, Airtel users get as much as 16GB of 3G or 4G data. That works out to Rs 10 per GB of data. He calls this sort of tariff structure a tragedy. The company believes that is unsustainable and either users should restrict usage to 1.6GB data for the same Rs 160 or pay a lot more. By that calculation, it would work out to Rs 100 per GB of 4G data.