BSNL To Discontinue Inactive Prepaid Mobile Connections
India’s National Telecom Backbone and Pan India 3G mobile service provider Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) today said that it will discontinue mobile services for prepaid customers on numbers that have no usage i.e., no Voice Calls (Incoming or Outgoing), SMS & Data for any continuous period of 90 days.
Prior Vodafone India and Bharti Airtel has also made it mandatory with 60 days disconnection norm for all inactive prepaid mobile numbers as earlier we shared on TelecomTalk.
Don’t Worry If You Are Abroad 
To facilitate BSNL prepaid customers going ABROAD or out of circles, who cannot maintain active status of their BSNL Prepaid Mobile Number continuously for a certain period, they may send SMS with key word, “KEEP CONNECTED FROM (dd-mm-yyyy) TO (dd-mm-yyyy) )” to 53733 to avoid disconnection.
According to BSNL’s statement this guideline has been implemented in the national security point of view and Department of Telecom’s (DoT) stringent guideline for allocation of new number series based on subscribers in VLR has created acute shortage of mobile numbers, for any telecom /mobile service provider company.
BSNL’s all new prepaid 2G and 3G customers will be intimated of the deactivation process in their starter kits while existing customers will be informed via SMS and outbound calls wherever possible.
With such tariff plans that fit into the pockets of all category of users BSNL is slowly getting in the business groove of developing user volume and thereby better business viability.
Regarding the need of revamping prepaid systems: Please read my Technical note on IN Prepaid-paid Telephone System and Capacity planning.
I am still not happy about BSNL asking people on travel abroad to send SMS as the phones are mostly left back home and hence this is impractical. BSNL could have given a toll free number to contact or an e-mail ID to send do not disconnect request.