It’s a good indication that VoIP is catching the fancy of Indian consumers. According to a report in Techshout, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) has launched an Internet telephony or Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service, which offers very inexpensive call rates for its customers in India. MTNL is the Broadband voice and data telecom services provider for the metros of Delhi and Mumbai in India. MTNL has joined hands with Aksh Optifibre to offer this service.

 

The service is called Netfone and it allows users to make inexpensive VoIP calls to more than 150 countries.

 

Initially, Netfone will be available on a prepaid basis and will also be available to all MTNL PCO holders. The customers will be given the choice of two types of plans. In the first plan, for a monthly rental of Rs 200, you can get 400 minutes of SIP-to-SIP calls free and 20 paise per minute subsequently. This plan is called Plan VoIP 200. In the second plan, you will pay a monthly rental of Rs 400 and get 800 minutes of SIP-to-SIP calls free and 10 paise per minute thereafter.

 

Now, here comes the best part. As most of the consumers in India do not yet have Internet connections at their homes, MTNL has come up with an option to make calls without a PC or the Internet connection! All you need is an adaptor (provided by MTNL) which will be attached to the fixed phone. This adaptor converts the phone into an (IPD) Internet protocol device. Says R S P Sinha, chairman and managing director, “We are now all set to connect the people of our country with the world and I am confident that people would be delighted with the service and demand would certainly increase.”

 

And if customers are fortunate enough to have a PC and Internet connection, their international call rates drop down to as low as 10 paise per minute (100 paise is equal to 1 Re and at the current rate, approximately 40 rupees equal one U.S. dollar).