Do-not-call registry proposed for India

Indian telephone subscribers may soon get some relief from telemarketing calls -- the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has proposed a National Do Not Call (NDNC) registry.

Telemarketers calling subscribers who have opted out of receiving such calls could face fines of about US$20 for each call and have their telecom service disconnected if they repeat the offense, TRAI of Delhi said Monday.

The NDNC registry is proposed to be set up by the National Informatics Center of the Indian government. Telephone service providers will have to create a mechanism to receive requests from subscribers who wish to be included in the do-not-call registry. These telephone numbers will be updated online on the NDNC registry, according to TRAI.

Telemarketers will have to submit online their calling list to the NDNC registry, where the list will be "scrubbed" by excluding the numbers listed in the registry, and the cleaned list will then be transferred back to the telemarketers, TRAI said.

India's telephone subscriber base crossed 200 million as of March 31, providing telemarketers with a large sales opportunity. Mobile and fixed-line telephone subscribers complained about an increase in the number of telemarketing calls, including from their service providers. The banking and financial services industry employs the most telemarketers, according to TRAI.

Some of these telemarketing firms are "out-of-garage" operations, and the first step being taken by TRAI is to ask them to register if they want to continue to operate. TRAI has also asked the country's central bank to ensure that telemarketers hired by them are registered.

Before becoming effective, the proposal from TRAI requires India's department of telecommunications to modify the licensing conditions of service providers.