In a curtain raiser of 3G services, the state telco, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam limited (MTNL) today launched the third generation (3G) mobile service for the first time in India.

The Indian Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh has formally launched the MTNL 3G service which has been named as ‘Jaadu’ at an event. Initially, this particular service will be available only in the national capital. This was launched at the inaugural programme of India Telecom 2008 jointly organized by the Indian Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

Among the others present were Union communications and IT Minister, Andimuthu Raja; Member of Parliament and FICCI president, Rajeev Chandrasekhar; Minister of state for Communications & IT, Jyotiraditya Schindhia and FICCI secretary general, Amit Mitra.

The Prime Minister congratulated MTNL and the communications minister for successfully launching the 3G service.

Singh further added, “I expect that 3G services will become the dominant platform on which we will be able to build and deliver upon India’s broadband objectives”.

Raja made a video call to demonstrate the impending 3G services.

Demonstrating the mobile TV facility available in 3G, Raja said, "Competition has to be the major propeller of the Indian economy and it has to be a sustainable one".

"However, effective objective and impartial regulations have to be an integral part of all these processes for investors to invest further," he added.

On the two state telcos, "BSNL (Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd) and MTNL have already been allotted 3G and broadband wireless access spectrum with a view to ensuring early rollout of 3G and WiMax services in the country."

On the controversial revenue and licence fee front, Raja said, "After migrating to revenue sharing regime, this sector has contributed Rs 500 billion (Rs 50,000 crore) through licence fee, entry fee and spectrum charges till the end of last financial year."

"During this financial year alone, it is expected that about Rs 160 billion (Rs 16,000 crore) will be collected from the licence fee and the spectrum charges," he added.

On the pricing, the MTNL Chairman and Managing Director, RSP Sinha said, “Our 3G pricing cannot be different from the existing prices across the world. So he pricing has to be affordable price then only 3G will sale”.

The price that the companies will have to pay has not yet been fixed. On that matter, Sinha added, “We are already working on the price factor but initially for almost a month we are launching it free of cost and giving it to our CIP customers. So the price will be reasonable, affordable and everyone will like it”.

The services would be commercialised by the end of January 2009.

The other state telco, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL), will launch its services in Chennai next month. X