This was disclosed by the Tata Teleservices managing director S Ramakrishnan while replying a media query on the occasion of company’s launch of fixed and wireless telephone services. “The first tranche of Rs 50 crore from VSNL will come on December 26, 2002,” he said.

Tata Teleservices formally announced the launch of its wireless and fixed telephone services in Delhi under the brand name ’Tata Indicom’ on Thursday. The company is offering its wireless in local loop (WLL) service under two tariff options. A standard tariff plan includes a monthly rental of Rs 200 and outgoing call charge of Rs 1.20 per three minutes while the incoming calls will be free. The customers, however, will have to pay Rs 2,400 for local access (Rs 4,400 for local/national long distance/international long distance), activation charges of Rs 1,000 for a connection.

The second plan, which will be valid only for 90 days after the launch, offers 400 free local calls on a monthly commitment of Rs 599. The monthly rental, local access and incoming calls will be free in this package. Moreover, the customer will have to pay only Rs 1,000 for NLD and Rs 2,000 for ILD access apart from Rs 1,000 as activation charges.

The services of the company, however, will not be available outside Delhi. It means that the user can not use the services in places like Noida, Gurgaon, Faridabad and Ghaziabad. Moreover, the Internet facility will not be available right now. “We will offer Internet only a few months after deploying packet switching equipment,” said chief operating officer for Delhi circle Rajiv Kataria. The company will invest around Rs 850 crore over the next five years in Delhi circle.