Blame It On Bsnl, Mobile Network Congestion Up Over 50% !

[Arun 795]

Press Trust of India

New Delhi, July 29, 2006

India’s teledensity is improving by the hour and the country has joined the prestigious 100-million mobile club. Good news both. But the bad part is, the level of congestion between telecom operators is getting worse.

The quality of service of mobile operators has deteriorated over the last five months with the latest TRAI figures stating that the number of points of interconnection (PoI) having congestion has increased by over 50%, and most of which are with state-run BSNL.

“The PoI congestion report for the month of January to May shows that the number of PoIs having congestion has increased from 390 in January to 616 in May”, Trai said.

The Trai parameter implies that not more than one call out of 200 should face any congestion problem.

However, in reality, the congestion levels are alarming, at times even touching 100% — or nearly every call facing a hiccup — in some parts of the country.

PoI congestion in the network is due to inadequate junctions between the two networks and this leads to loss of calls and also results in poor quality of service to telecom consumers.

The worst affected PoIs where congestion level on PoIs is 80% or more, from private operator to BSNL, the regulator said. The PoIs congestion in the network is on account of inadequate junctions between the two networks and this leads to loss of calls and the consequent poor quality of service to the consumers.

The benchmark notified by Trai in the QoS regulation of July 2005 for this parameter is less than 0.5%.

Trai has been monitoring the level of congestion at the PoI between various service providers on a monthly basis. This parameter signifies the ease by which a customer of one network is able to communicate with a customer of another network.

This parameter also reflects as to how effective is the interconnection between two networks.

For instance, Bharti Airtel’s congestion level, where the PoI is with BSNL, touched a high of 86.21% in Sasaram (Bihar); 94.4% in Jaunpur (Uttar Pradesh); and 89.11% in Churu (Himachal Pradesh).

In the case of Hutchison Essar, the congestion level was recorded at 87% in Gazipur, where again the PoI is with BSNL.

Similarly, with BSNL as the PoI, Reliance Infocomm reported 100% congestion at Durg, and 95.40% at Pune. Others such as Idea Cellular and Tata Teleservices have also shown over 80% congestion levels in some parts of UP and Bihar, when PoIs are with BSNL.

But there’s some good news as well. Bharti’s congestion level in Shimla dropped from 19% in January to 11.66% in May.

Also, in Bikaner and Kota, congestion has been reduced from 38.28% and 41.53%, respectively, to 0% each.

In the case of Tata Teleservices, Alwar has shown a drop from 19% congestion in January to 9.65% in May. Reliance Infocomm’s congestion level in Patna has reduced from 20.5% in January to 1.4% in May.

The private telecom industry is discussing ways to set up an interconnect exchange, on the lines of the “Telehouse” in Europe, US and Canada.

[ani_meher 42]

Also, in Bikaner and Kota, congestion has been reduced from 38.28% and 41.53%, respectively, to 0% each.

All the mobile users have stopped using mobiles in these 2 places???