Will Airtel’s tariff hike turn a corner for India’s telecom sector?

India’s second-largest telecom operator has taken the lead in hiking prepaid mobile tariffs to give itself some elbow room to roll out 5G in India and also make further investments in network and spectrum. Effective from November 26, Airtel’s prepaid plans will get costlier by up to 25 per cent as the company has instituted a sharp broad-based hike that will affect all packs.

The most notable is the hike in tariff of its entry-level 28-day voice-only plan to Rs 99 from Rs 79. According to India Ratings and Research, Airtel could be aiming at shifting non-data customers to data customers, which can lead to higher average revenue per user.