The number of telecom subscribers has escalated to cross the 750 million mark and so to meet the growing number of landline connections, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has recommended a 10 digit numbering scheme for landlines numbers, similar to mobile numbers. It has suggested that the country migrate to an integrated numbering scheme for both fixed landline and mobile numbers by December 31, 2011.

This suggestion has come under severe strain with the numbering crunch that mobile operators are facing due to a massive expansion of subscribers every month. With this recommendation, TRAI has come forward that the uniform 10 digit numbering system for both the mobiles and fixed phones would make sufficient numbers to develop the existing services and carry the newer services for the next 30-40 years.

In a statement, TRAI said, "The existing 10-digit numbering scheme for mobile telephony should be continued to avoid inconvenience to the customers that would accompany any move to shift to an 11-digit numbering scheme".

Every month, over 1.5-crore mobile subscribers being added that makes India the fastest growing mobile market in the world and issuing new numbering schemes is becoming a big problem for the Department of Telecommunications (DoT). While the ‘9' series took over 10 years to get engaged, the ‘8' series, issued recently by the DoT, is also likely to get fatigued by next year. Though initially, the DoT was planning to use an 11-digit mobile number series instead of the existing 10-digit, the TRAI has recommended 10-digit phone number for both landline and mobile phones to meet future requirements.

The earlier framed national numbering plan 2003 has already been surpassed in the year 2009 which was designed for 750 million customers, including 450 million mobile connections to last till 2030. As per statistics given by TRAI, the number of subscribers likely to increase to one billion by 2014 and this situation has brought the TRAI under pressure to install a new urgent plan that would save the system from collapsing.

Till the time the 10-digit number scheme for fixed lines is implemented, the dialling of intra-circle calls from fixed lines to mobile will be with ‘0' prefixed. Trai said, “This would enable exploitation of spare capacity available in the sub-levels of the existing short distance charging area codes to the extent of one billion numbers without affecting any telephone number or STD code”.

It was also said by the authority that service providers should not have more than three million unutilized numbers in a service area when they request for a new block of numbers. In addition that the allocation process must be automated TRAI said, “This will prevent the accumulation of unutilised numbers by the service providers.”

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