Telecom Operators in Mumbai The city has basic landline operators as well as Cell phone operators. Land line numbers are 8 digits long, whereas GSM cellular operators are 10 digits.

Land Line

• MTNL: The largest and oldest operator in the telephone business in the government owned Mahanagar Telecom Nigam Limited (MTNL). It has 2.5 million suscribers. Its suscriber base is high as it was a monopoly till the late 90's. MTNL phone numbers start with the prefix '2'.

• Tata Indicom: (Formerly Hughes Telecom)A new entrant, it has garnered about 200,000 suscribers. Tata Indicom is a relatively new player taking over Hughes Telecom in 2002. Its numbers start with '5'.

Cell Phone Operators

Ever since cellular technology was opened up in India in the mid 90's, Mumbai has been in the forefront of the action. The city has over 3 million suscribers. Cellular operators are divided in the GSM and CDMA operators.

GSM Operators

• Orange: The largest GSM operator in Bombay is Orange, a part of Hutch. It has a large user base and has a large network. Orange numbers start with '9820' or '9819' and are 10 digits long.

• BPL: BPL is a veteran in mobile telephony. However, it is not as large as Orange. BPL numbers start with '9821' or '9870' and are 10 digits long.

• Airtel: Airtel started operations in Mumbai in 2002-2003. It has rapidly grown in numbers since then. Airtel has the advantage of being a national player. Airtel is owned by Bharti Group. Airtel numbers start with '9892' and are 10 digits long.

• Dolphin : Dolphin is the GSM branch of MTNL. It is state owned and is the smallest player among the GSM companies.

CDMA

CDMA operations make use of Wireless Local Loop (WLL). CDMA operations were launched in 2002.

• Reliance Infocomm: Reliance Infocomm is the largest mobile operator in India. It has a huge user base and extends to small towns. Operations started in 2003. Numbers start with '3' and are 8 digits long.

• Tata Indicom: Tata Indicom, like Reliance also offers CDMA connections. However Tata is a local player and does not have any operations on a national scale.

• Garuda : The pioneer in WLL technology, is the state owned MTNL. Operations started in 1999.

Tata and Reliance also offer a land line hybrid phone. The phone is like a normal instrument, but instead of the phone cable it has an antenna which connects to the network like any mobile phone. Internet connection also is possible though this via dialup.