\"Government will fully respect the SC order and, within the legal purview, the government will also take care of consumers,\" Sinha told reporters on the side lines of a conference organised by India Post on the occasion of Word Post Day.
Telcos have said they were awaiting directions from the DoT on the way ahead, especially on the method for complying with know-your-customer rules and on the need and methodology to destroy data collected through the Aadhaar verification process within six months, as mandated by the apex court.
For the operators, the Supreme Court’s order was a setback as they were using the 12-digit unique code for instantaneous customer verification, helping activate a new connection in less than an hour. This compares to 5-7 days through the earlier process of physical verification in the pre-Aadhaar era, which was also far costlier than the new method.
Although Aadhaar-based KYC was voluntary, more than 90% of new subscriptions come using the unique ID due to factors such as convenience. However some subscribers avoided it on fears around privacy and data leakage. More than 500 million, or some 50% of India’s mobile phone user base, have linked Aadhaar to their phone number.
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Separately, Sinha admitted there were some call drop issues, especially in metropolitan cities, which he said was due to infrastructure expansion challenges owing mainly to lack of awareness among people who fear radiation from telecom towers will affect their health.
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\"In many areas, especially in metros, there are call drops<\/a>. It will require satisfactory infrastructure to mitigate the problem. There is tower deployment problem in large cities, including Mumbai and Delhi,\" he said.
Sinha added that the World Health Organisation conducted as many as 25,000 studies but there was not a single report that could point out any ill effects on health due to radiation from any tower.
The department of telecommunications (DoT), according to him, has started an awareness drive throughout the country and has already launched the portal Tarang to access the radiation quantum where a consumer can pay Rs 4,000 to get authenticated report of any nearby tower.
Recently, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi<\/a> had pulled up the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for the call drop problem after he himself faced issues while he was on the move in New Delhi.
The department is eyeing technological solutions to overcome call drops, which is also blamed on the surging data usage that has outpaced tower deployments, in addition to inadequate investments by incumbents on infrastructure upgrade and expansion.
\"Call drops require regular monitoring and the government have set standards to see whether it is improving or declining,\" the minister said, adding that as per the telecom regulator's finding call drop situation was constantly improving in the last three to four quarters.
Telcos such as Bharti Airtel<\/a> and Vodafone<\/a> Idea Ltd. (VIL) blame Right-of-Way (RoW) as a major impediment for putting or expanding mobile tower infrastructure, particularly in large cities and residential colonies.
\"We are working to expand infrastructure. Telecom infrastructure has grown from 8 lakh base transceiver stations to more than 18 lakh today,\" Sinha added.
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