Sunil MIttal, the Chairman of GSM Association (GSMA), has declared a war on roaming with the promise that these charges will be a thing of the past.
"Within my term in GSMA, roaming charges will be a thing of the past," he said in his keynote address at the Mobile World Congress 2017 here in Barcelona.
Mittal, who is also the Chairman of India's largest telecom operator Bharti Airtel, also called for common infrastructure that could reduce costs and bring in a lot of benefits for the industry.
A common infrastructure initiative is already happening on the sub-sea and tower fronts, while it is not enought on the fibre front. "We need to accelerate it," he added.
Separately, Airtel has announced free incoming calls and SMS and no premium on outgoing calls while roaming across India. There will no be data romaing charges also, the company said in a statement.
"Airtel mobile customers will be able to carry their numbers across India and the world and stay connected all the time without having to worry about high call/data charges. Bill shocks will now be a thing of the past," it said in a statement.