With Reliance opening up its GSM services in Mumbai with a bash, there are other interesting prepaid packs which telecom subscribers in other circles can look for. The packs we are exhibiting here are weekend unlimited packs for Reliance GSM’s Bihar, Jharkhand and Kolkata circles.

33 Unlimited talking

• This pack allows users to make unlimited calling to local Reliance GSM and CDMA numbers

• This pack can be activated on a Friday and can be used from 00:00 hours every Saturday (end of Friday) for the next 2 days

39 Unlimited Internet

• This pack allows users to access unlimited GPRS and internet on EDGE enabled phones

• This pack can be activated on a Friday and can be used from 00:00 hours every Saturday (end of Friday) for the next 3 days.

These offers are available only through e-recharge between 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. every Friday only. Also, these are promotional offers from Reliance, so the time period till when these would be available is not known.

Subsequent to RCom’s nationwide launch of GSM, it has announced its GSM start up in Mumbai with a bang. To take the competition head-on it is offering extremely lucrative offers and start-up packs. Here are the details:

• RCom is offering its GSM SIM cards (pre paid) for a mere amount of Rs 25.

• The SIM cards come with a subscription validity of 6 months.

• Every subscriber gets free talk time worth Rs. 900 spread over 90 days i.e. a new subscriber would get Rs 10 talktime every day for the first 90 days.

• Call rates: Local – Re 1/min; STD Rs 1.50/min to any network

• Subscribers can recharge using top-up cards ranging from Rs 10 to Rs 500.

• If this was not enough, Reliance GSM users will also get unlimited night calling (10 PM to 6 AM) on Reliance network (both GSM and CDMA) absolutely free through out Mumbai, Maharashtra and Goa, giving access to seven million Reliance phones in this region.

We say: Not bad at all. Reliance is offering Rs 900 worth talk time, half year validity, plus a lot of free stuff only for Rs 25. This start-up pack will definitely tempt mobile users to at least try their services.

RCom has come up with another good value for money plan designed for users having moderate local and STD usage. It’s called the Platinum Plan 225 and here are the details:

Monthly Rental: Rs. 225
CLIP: Free
Free: Rs 100 worth Mobile-to-Mobile local calls; Rs 100 worth Local/National SMS
Calling charge to local mobile: 30p/min
Calling charge to local landline numbers: 80p/min
Local/National SMS: 30p/SMS
STD calling charge to all numbers: Rs 1.25/min

That sums up to 333 local mobile calls and 333 all India SMSes for Rs. 225. However, this plan is available only in major cities and only for those who opt for a new connection. RCom’s yet another move to lure new customers!

RCom signed up a deal recently with HTC to sell the CDMA version of the Touch Diamond (P3051) phone. It might be good news for some people but with the price tag it carries, it surely is way out of budget for majority of the RCom users. They are selling it for freakin 40K or Rs. 39,900 to be precise. Agreed its got all the goodness of TouchFLO 3D on a 2.8-inch VGA screen, 4GB memory, Windows 6.1 OS, 3.2-megapixel camera and much more but paying 13K premium over the GSM version of Airtel doesn’t look justified to me. Ok, you argue that CDMA radio gives good voice clarity and better data rate transfers but paying 13K more for that is not a viable decision for me. Don’t you think?

We saw Tata Teleservices franchise Virgin Mobile revising its local and STD calling rates this week. Now its time for RCom to do so. RCom on Wednesday added a new recharge pack to their Jaadu basket. This pack is meant to lower outgoing call rates for prepaid subscribers who are looking for a lifetime commitment with Reliance Mobile. This plan is called the ‘Lifetime Jaadu Pack’ and offers:

• Local calls to any phone – 50p/min
• STD calls to any phone – Re 1/min
• Pack price – Rs 550

This pack is a boon for subscribers with lifetime validity as they can now just subscribe once to this pack and enjoy the lowered calling rates for lifetime as compared to buying packs and special tariff vouchers every month for making affordable outgoing calls.

RCom announced on Sunday that it has commenced its GSM network across Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Surat, Lucknow and Ludhiana on a test basis by providing approximately 10,000 test SIM cards to its employees.

Talking about Mumbai, RCom has invested around Rs. 800 crore in Mumbai for setting up 2,500 towers and other necessary infrastructure. RCom would be the second player after Idea Cellular to launch its GSM services in the city in this year. It is expected that RCom will open its services for public by the end of this year.

Also another speculation making rounds is that Tata Teleservices are also planning to launch their GSM services around the same time, although no official announcement is made by Tata’s telecom arm.

Reliance GSM which planned to enter the Mumbai circle might just be planning out for its grand launch. GSM users in Mumbai are seeing a new network added to the list of available networks. This one is called IND15. There are news about Reliance GSM testing its networks in Mumbai and this might just be a semi-official confirmation. 

With already new players entering the circle, this would add one more to the count. Let’s see if the rookies can face the biggie in India’s busiest and the most profitable circle. 

Just search network manually to find it. The IND 799 is the Idea network and the IND15 is the mysterious one.

Airtel, Vodafone and RCom have revealed their latest offering from their Blackberry portfolio. They will soon be selling RIM’s Blackberry flagship phone, Bold at a hefty price tag of Rs. 34,990. This is the best Blackberry phone to come out of RIM’s stable and if you’re not so price conscious then you might be able to pick it up from the end of this month, if you’re an Airtel or Vodafone customer or by end of October if you’re under RCom GSM service.

Despite the controversy which hounded Blackberry services and RIM for quite some time, there is a continuous upward trend in the number of Blackberry users in India. And seeing it as an opportunity, Reliance Communications announced the availability of prepaid Blackberry services which is a first-of-its-kind in India. Prepaid plans for Blackberry start from Rs. 1,099 which goes upto Rs. 1,599 giving the user the benefits of free local SMS, voice and STD calls. Supported phones are:

BlackBerry 8830 World Edition smartphone, which operates on both CDMA & GSM networks
BlackBerry Curve 8330 smartphone on CDMA networks
BlackBerry Curve 8300 smartphone on GSM networks
BlackBerry Pearl 8100 smartphone on GSM networks
BlackBerry Pearl 8130 smartphone on CDMA networks, and
BlackBerry 8703e smartphone on CDMA networks

RCom Blackberry Prepaid

RCom a couple of days back added the Nokia 2505 to its range of handsets. This stylish clamshell comes with a sleek and elegant body and a 65,536 colors display with 128 x 160 pixels resolution. It is equipped with a Quick-press flashlight and FM radio. It also has a two-way handsfree speakerphone.

RCom is offering this bundled offer of connection + CDMA handset for Rs. 3099. Along with this, it is offering free talktime worth Rs 600. The sad part is, this talktime can only be used to make local calls from Reliance Mobile to Reliance Mobile and it is allotted to you in installments of Rs 50 per month for 12 months.

On the whole, this offering is not lucrative enough to tempt buyers to immediately go and grab it; on the contrary if you are looking to buy a Reliance connection then this offer can be given a thought.