In a bid to make it difficult for illegal telemarketing companies to get a phone connection, the telecom regulator has made it mandatory for telecom companies to set up a system that will allow tracking of unauthorised firms which have been blacklisted.

Telecom companies, including Aircel, Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices, have been told to submit weekly report on disconnected numbers, which will be put up on a Web site.

A top TRAI official told Business Line: “We are putting in place a tracking mechanism to see how many lines have been disconnected. We have sent communication to all three companies (Reliance, Tata and Aircel) asking them to institutionalise a system through which disconnected numbers can be tracked. We have asked them to inform us on a weekly basis how many have been disconnected so that we can put it up on our Web site.”

“The problem is that the unauthorised telemarketers keep getting new SIM cards when their numbers are disconnected. From June 30, we plan to blacklist all such companies so that they cannot get new SIMs for the next two years,” the official added. TRAI had recently introduced a new law to curb the menace of unwanted calls and SMSes. Under this new rule, telephone connection given to unauthorised telemarketers will be disconnected immediately on the first complaint and they will be blacklisted for two years. During these two years, no phone company can offer a connection to the blacklisted individual or entity. Earlier, the illegal telemarketers were issued warnings and penalised before disconnection.

For making a complaint through SMS, a customer has to SMS “the unsolicited commercial communication, XXX… dd/mm/yy” to 1909. Where ‘XXX…’ is the ten-digit telephone number or header of the SMS, from which the unsolicited message has originated.

The telephone number or header and the date of receipt of the unsolicited commercial SMS may be appended with such SMS, while forwarding to 1909, with or without space after comma.

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