TRAI's proclamation to impose a charge on the telecom operators for new number allocations has taken in bad sense by the service providers.

Their community has strongly refuted it and said that any such proposal is totally unwarranted.

The operators have said that they are already paying a hefty amount to the government in terms of spectrum and licence fees. And on top of it levying charges for numbering resources (the most basic need for accessing any telecom service) is totally uncalled for.

TRAI has answered by stating that the service providers are not utilizing the numbers in a proper way. And looking at the rapid penetration of mobile services, it has planned to revise the pricing structures.

Bharti Airtel expressed its dismay and said, "New block of numbers are allotted only after demonstrating 60 and 80 per cent utilization stringently for mobile and fixed line respectively".

RCom on the other hand said that charging of numbers is not preferable and will harm the long-term growth of the telecom sector in the country.

The company warned that hoarding can happen because of this.