Mobile telephone numbering in India
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has divided India into various cellular zones such that within each zone, the call is treated as a local call, while across zones, it becomes a long-distance call. A cellular zone (or cellular circle) is normally the entire state, with a few exceptions like Mumbai (which is a different zone), Goa (which is a part of the Maharashtra zone), Jharkhand (which is a part of the Bihar zone) or Uttar Pradesh (divided into multiple zones).
From May 20, 2005, calls between Mumbai Metro and Maharashtra Telecom Circle, Chennai Metro and Tamilnadu Telecom Circle, Kolkata Metro and West Bengal Telecom Circle and Uttar Pradesh (East) and Uttar Pradesh (West) Telecom Circle Service Areas are merged in Inter service area connectivity. With the above arrangement, calls within a State in the above-mentioned four States would be treated as intra-service area call for the purposes of routing as well as Access Deficit Charges (ADC). The dialing procedure for calls within a State for these States would also be simplified i.e. dialling of mobile-to mobile subscribers and fixed-to-mobile subscribers would be without prefixing '0'.
All mobile numbers in India have the prefix 9 (This includes pager services, but the use of pagers is on the decline). Each zone is allowed to have multiple private operators (earlier it was 2 private + BSNL/MTNL, subsequently it was changed to 3 private + BSNL/MTNL in GSM 900/1800, now each zone has 4-5 operators including BSNL/MTNL in GSM, and 2 private + BSNL/MTNL in CDMA).
All cellphone numbers are 10 digits long, (normally) split up as OO-AA-NNNNNN where OO is the operator code, AA is the zone code assigned to the operator, and NNNNNN is the subscriber number.
Numbering plan
- 90-xx-yyyyyy - Various operators except Reliance (CDMA), TATA and BSNL.
- 91-xx-yyyyyy - Various operators except Reliance (CDMA), TATA and BSNL.
- 92-xx-yyyyyy - TATA Indicom Numbers
- 93-xx-yyyyyy - Reliance Mobile (CDMA) Numbers
- 94-xx-yyyyyy - BSNL Numbers
- 96-xx-yyyyyy - Various operators except Reliance (CDMA), TATA and BSNL
- 97-xx-yyyyyy - Various operators except Reliance (CDMA), TATA and BSNL
- 98-xx-yyyyyy - Various operators except Reliance (CDMA), TATA and BSNL
- 99-xx-yyyyyy - Various operators except Reliance (CDMA), TATA and BSNL
After 15th April 2009, many cellular networks like Datacom Solutions (Videocon Group), Unitech Wireless (Unitech Group), Loop Telecom (The Ruias), Shyam Telelink, Idea (Aditya Birla Group), Swan Telecom, ByCell Telecom, etc. are planning to roll-out their services across many Telecom Circles in India.
Check out this also:Mobile Phone Numbers, Operator and Circle
Source: Wikipedia