Tata Teleservices Limited has joined hands with NIT DOCOMO to launch the TATA DOCOMO GSM brand in India. Their inaugural services will start in Chennai and will cover Tamil Nadu.

The first call was made by the TTSL Managing Director Anil Sardana from TATA DOCOMO’s 3G network to the Union Minister for Telecommunications and Information Technology A Raja. Within a fortnight the South Indian circle will go live and within a year a countrywide rollout is guaranteed.

The Chairman Tata Sons, Ratan Tata called ‘it is a triumph for the consumer.’

The pay-as-you-use scheme was launched at one paisa per second for voice call.

Speaking in a video address Mr. Toshinari Kunieda, Senior Vice-President and Managing Director, Global Business Division, NTT DOCOMO stated that all the world class services and products such as i-modeTM, Location-Based Services (LBS) and mobile payment that are experienced in Japan and other countries will be made available in India.

Some of the other value added features offered by TATA DOCOMO are 24-hour music, cricket commentary, free missed call alerts and voice chat. VoiceMail will be completely free with no rentals, deposits or renewal charges.

The services will cover 2115 km of the state highways, 1897 km of rail routes and tourist destinations. Apart from this 17 religious centers in Tamil Nadu also will be under the network coverage.

TATA DOCOMO has been offered license to operate in 19 telecom circles and Spectrum has been allotted in 18 of the 19 circles.

DOCOMO is the world’s top mobile operator and has more than 50 percent of the Japanese mobile users under their control.