Pakistan is planning to propose zero international roaming tariff in the Saarc region, reported Voice n Data citing Sardar Latif Khosa, Minister for IT and Telecom.
The Ministry of Information Technology & Telecommunications has internally proposed this initiative. “Implementation can happen only after getting approvals from several stakeholders,” Sardar Muhammad Latif Khan Khosa, federal minister, Ministry of Information Technology & Telecommunications, told Voice&Data.
“We want to take more steps to bring people closer. Technology can bring harmony among countries. This will be one of the few steps to achieve our dreams,” he added.
Despite bilateral trade agreements for several years, roaming between India and Pakistan has been a contentious issue. Reduction in international roaming rates has been one of the demands of users among the Saarc countries, including India. If the proposal is introduced, it will be a revolutionary step in the conflict ridden region.
India, though making efforts for reducing tension between the two countries, is yet to consider a zero international roaming. Most of the private operators in India are against reduction in international tariffs.
In fact, international roaming and ISD charges in the Saarc region are very high and it affects the business.
I use Glow which already has pretty pocket friendly rates :).. and darn cool TVCs http://www.youtube.com/user/WaridGlow#p/a/u/0/Q5wTtbgXLLk .. but yes this will be a very good thing too.
Only idiots with zero level understanding of international roaming could advise a cow like Khossa to make such a dumb statement.
SAARC is not like europe where there is mutual traveling and thus much more traffic than what SAARC has despite being the most populous region.
India and Pakistan do not have roaming arrangement due to seurity reasons and the number of people corssing borders is very low.
So we can definitely have zero roaming for bangladesh, srilanka, maldives amd bhutan!
Wow this really takes some where dear Advisor (who has been foolishly advised by the incompetent team in MoiT)
Like always Advisor has made a statement that has nothing to do with his portfolio but have an interesting soundbite and news headline value.
Why would operators opt for zero international roaming when it is a good opportunity for them to mint money? just because the anokha ladla of Pakistan’s MoIT was ill advised by the platoon of buffoons including Secretary and the highly qualified Member Telecom?
May god help this country!