While the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) seems to have softened itsstand against the company following assurances by the company that it "wouldnot default and pay our dues" amounting to 69 per cent of the total licencefee of Rs 127 crore, cell users in Gujarat are in for tough times ahead.

For, in a shrewd move, the operator has decided to shore up its bottom linesirrespective of the the Delhi High Court order, which while striking downthe calling party paid regime, has simultaneously directed the TRAI toensure that cellular service providers pass on some of the benefits of thelower licence fee sharing revenue formula to cell users.

Fascel has decided to almost double the cost of CelSuvidha, its highlypopular pre-paid SIM card services. In a press release announcing the launchof the CelSuvidha Mobile Phone Recharging cards, the company has waxedeloquent about how "CelSuvidha users have a lot more convenience with SNbased platform."

It goes on to add that in the new system, a cell user merely has to go toone of the over 2,000 outlets of CelSuvidha across the state and pick up arecharge coupon instead of the old system where recharging was done manuallyat the 31 recharge centres in the state. And once the consumer is inpossession of a recharge coupon, he can recharge his pre-paid card on hisown at his own convenience, any day, any time.

"The new system is free of all human interface and all recharging is done onair - making it very convenient and user-friendly." Incidentally, rechargecoupons are offered by several cellular service providers in the country.But what the release, as well as the company's new brochure convenientlyglosses over is the fact that the consumer will have to pay a heavy pricefor Fascel's decision to go high-tech.

Thus, while prior to January 17, recharging a pre-paid SIM card cost aminimum of Rs 1,000 with a five per cent service tax and had a validity of90 days, the recharge coupons would come in denominations of two - the firstone costing Rs 787.50 would have a talk time of Rs 600 with a validity ofonly 30 days while the second one, costing Rs 1260 with a talk time of Rs1200 would have a validity of 75 days. Translated into bare facts, thismeans a consumer would have to cough up Rs 600 monthly for pre-paid serviceswhich earlier worked out to a mere Rs 333 a month.

When contacted, Fascel assistant vice president, Sanjeev Ghanate, admittedthat they had been a "hike" in the pre-paid card service which had been doneafter conducting a survey of the usage and revenues. However, he maintainedthat it had become imperative for the company to switch over to the SN basedplatform as under the old system "validity was not controlled by thesystem." He, however, hastened to add that even at the new price, CelSuvidhawas still fairly competitive and "our tariffs are still the lowest."