GrameenPhone makes history

The main growth spurt for Grameen has happened in the last three years or so; for, it took first six years to reach the one-million mark. Then on the subscription grew by leaps and bounds -- in the seventh year, the second million was reached, in the next six months the third million, fourth million in September, 2004 and now it hovers over five million. Just how the mobile has caught on, can be measured by the simple statistic that, in the first ten months of the current year alone, the subscription has doubled from 25 lac to 50 lac.

The public sector BTTB with its long history, excluding the Pakistan days, still has a long way to go before tallying even the first million. The success of Grameen, or for that matter, of Citicell, Aktel and BanglaLink goes to basically underscore the point of what right policy decisions and business environment could do to multiply communication access to people.

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Grameen's joint venture with Telenor of Norway, the first in Asia, has provided the technology and management expertise required to vanguard the mobile revolution in these parts.

However, on reaching the landmark figure in terms of subscription-base, the GrameenPhone's obligations to improve its services, even more, by promptly responding to subscribers' complaints, if any, grows that much more.

There is a feeling that GrameenPhone has not always matched its commercial success with service to its customers or sensitivity to the latter's complaints. The point that telecommunications have a huge potential for empowering people economically, socially and politically through greater information sharing and interaction need not be laboured too much. In view of what more could be achieved in this domain, it is time the government thought of withdrawing the tax on SIM card.