Lok Sabha Question No. 4242 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2018-03-21
Subject: Call Drop Problem
Ministry: COMMUNICATIONS
Asked by: DILIP PATEL, KUNWAR PUSHPENDRA SINGH CHANDEL

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS

## LOK  SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO.4242

## TO BE ANSWERED ON 21 ST     MARCH, 2018

## CALL DROP PROBLEM

## 4242.   SHRI DILIP PATEL:

SHRI KUNWAR PUSHPENDRA SINGH CHANDEL:

Will the Minister of COMMUNICATIONS be pleased to state:

- (a) whether a permanent solution for the call drop problem has been found and if so, the details thereof;
- (b) whether the problem of call drop is unique to the country and if so, the details thereof and the reasons therefor;
- (c) whether the Government proposes to cancel license of telecom companies that fail to end call drop problem in the near future and if so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor; and
- (d) whether  the  performance  of  BSNL  in  addressing  the  problem  of  call  drop  is  worse  as compared to other private telecom companies and if so, the details thereof and the reasons therefor along with the steps taken by the Government in this regard?

## ANSWER

## THE MINISTER OF STATE (IC) OF THE MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS & MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS (SHRI MANOJ SINHA)

- (a) to (c) The calls on mobile phones which, due to technical reasons, get cut off before the speaking  parties  finish  their  conversation  and  before  one  of  them  hangs  up,  are  classified  as dropped calls. In wireless networks, it is a world-wide phenomenon and not unique to any particular country. Call drops may happen in wireless networks due to various reasons like:
- (i) Poor radio coverage- Non availability of suitable tower-locations, may be due to acquisition problems and sealing of towers by local authorities/ Resident Welfare Organization (RWA)/ Owners due to fear of Electro Magnetic Field (EMF) issues;
- (ii) Radio interference due to use of unauthorized repeaters;
- (iii)      Change in pattern of traffic- Exponential growth in traffic due to more   use of smart phones which may result in shrinkage of 3G cell size;
- (iv) Non  availability  of  24x7  power  resulting  in  shutdown  of  tower/  Base  Transceiver  Stations (BTS);
- (v) Poor Radio Frequency (RF) optimization efforts: Network Optimization is a process through which different soft parameters (BTS power, neighbour definitions) and hard parameters (e.g. Electrical Tilt, Mechanical Tilt, Azimuth etc.) of the BTS are changed in order to improve the coverage area and quality of signal.

In order to resolve the problem of call drop, Government and TSPs have taken various steps like:

-  making available sufficient spectrum for mobile services including auction of 965 MHz in 2016,
-  allowing  Spectrum  Sharing,  Trading  and  liberalisation  of  administratively  allocated spectrum as per the guidelines to facilitate efficient utilisation,
-  permitting  sharing  of  active  as  well  as  passive  infrastructure  by  the  telecom  service providers for achieving higher utilisation efficiency,

-  notification  of  Indian  Telegraph  Right  of  Way  Rules,  2016  in  November  2016  for regulating underground  infrastructure  (optical  fibre)  and  over-ground  infrastructure (mobile towers),
-  periodic review of expansion of mobile networks and related improvements carried out by  the  Telecom  Service  Providers  (TSPs)-  leading  to  addition  of  around  6.66  lakh additional BTS on aggregate basis for 2G/3G/4G services during the period- June 2015 to February 2018,
-  facilitating  use  of  Government  estate  for  installation  of  mobile  towers      on  multiplesharing basis,
-  launching  of  Tarang  Sanchar,  a  public  web  portal  for  information  sharing  on  mobile towers and their EMF compliances, in May 2017.

As a result of continuous efforts put-in by the Government and Telecom Service Providers (TSPs), consistent improvements have been noted in compliance to Telecom Regulatory Authority of  India's  (TRAI)  Quality  of  service  benchmarks  for  both  2G  and  3G  services.  TRAI  has  been imposing financial disincentives against service providers who fail to comply with the benchmarks for various quality of service parameters, including for call drop.

To monitor the performance of Service Providers on call drop for both 2G and 3G services, TRAI has prescribed two parameters viz. 'call drop rate (benchmark ≤ 2%)' on monthly average basis for the licensed Service Area and 'worst affected cells having more than 3% Traffic Channel (TCH) drop/ Circuit Switched Voice drop rate (benchmark ≤ 3%).'  Any Cell with TCH drop/Circuit Switched Voice drop rate > 3% is treated as bad cell whose performance is to be improved.

As  per  TRAI's  Performance  Indicator  Report  for  the  quarter  July  to  September  2017,  all TSPs providing 2G and 3G services comply to TRAI's Call drop benchmark of ≤ 2% for Licensed Service Area (LSA) as a whole.

Further,  compliance  to  another  benchmark,  Worst  affected  cells  having  Traffic  Channel (TCH)  drop  rate  with  benchmark  ≤  3%  has  also  improved  consistently.  For  2G  services,  noncompliance in this regard has significantly decreased from 54 in quarter ending September 2015 to 20  in  quarter  ending  September  2017.  For  3G  services,  non-compliance  in  this  regard  has significantly decreased from 20 to 09 in the corresponding period.

Further, the network related parameters were recently reviewed and notified on 18.08.2017. Two  new  parameters  for  assessing  call  drop,  viz.  DCR  spatial  distribution  measure  or  DCR Network\_QSD (90,90) (benchmark  2%)  implies  that  at-least  90%  of  Cells  in  the  network  should perform  better  than  specified  2%  benchmark  on  at-least  90%  of  days.  Similarly,  another  new parameter DCR temporal distribution measure or DCR Network\_QTD (97,90) will give confidence that on at-least 90% of Days, network performed better than specified 3% benchmark for at-least 97% of the Cells.  Financial Disincentive have also been enhanced from Rs. 1 lakh to 5 lakh for 1 st violation and 1.5 to 2 times, capping Rs. 10 lakh for 2 nd  & subsequent violations. The regulations have since come into force from 1st October, 2017.

(d) As per TRAI Reports, BSNL has been consistently complying to call-drop rate benchmark of ≤ 2% for both 2G and 3G services in all operating LSAs for the last four quarters i.e, October to December 2016,  January  to  March  2017,  April  to  June  2017,  July  to  September  2017.  Further, BSNL has been complying to second benchmark i.e. Worst affected Cells having more than 3% Traffic Channel (TCH) drop/ Circuit Switched Voice drop rate ≤ 3% for both 2G & 3G services in all operating LSAs except West Bengal during the corresponding last four quarters.

Hence, the overall performance of BSNL mobile networks against call-drop rate benchmarks remains comparable with other TSPs for both 2G & 3G services.

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