Centre removes distinction between domestic, international Other Service Providers

Ravi Shankar Prasad. File Pic

The central government on Wednesday removed the distinction between domestic and international OSPs (Other Service Providers) allowing BPO centres with common telecom resources to serve customers located worldwide including in India.

Addressing a press conference, the Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ravi Shankar Prasad said, "We have issued a guideline today that is very extensively liberalising the other service providers' guidelines.

The guideline is revolutionary in nature that will make India a very favourable destination for the expansion of voice-related BPO centres. These guidelines are designed to put India as a very central and serious player in the entire international BPO and voice-related industry." Prasad informed that India's BPO industry is one of the largest in the world. Today India's IT-BPM industry stands at USD 37.6 billion (2019-20), which is Rs 2.8 lakh crores approximately, giving job opportunities to lakhs of youths in the country.

Further, it has a potential for double-digit growth reaching up to USD 55.5 billion that is Rs 3.9 lakh crores by 2025. "The distinction between Domestic and International OSPs has been removed. A BPO centre with common Telecom resources will now be able to serve customers located worldwide including in India. EPABX (Electronic Private Automatic Branch Exchange) of the OSP can be located anywhere in the world.

OSPsapart from utilising EPABX services of the Telecom Service Providers can also locate their EPABX at Third Party Data Centres in India," stated the union minister. With the removal of the distinction between domestic and international OSP centres, the interconnectivity between all types of OSP centres is now permitted.

He further said, "Remote Agents of OSP can now connect directly with the Centralised EPABX/ EPABX of the OSP/ EPABX of the customer using any technology including broadband over wireline/ wireless. There is now no restriction for data interconnectivity between any OSP centres of the same company or group company or any unrelated company."

Prasad emphasised that DoT has already exempted Data-Based Services from the OSP regulations. In addition, the regulations exempted OSPs from the requirement of any registration. Also, no bank guarantees were to be furnished. Work from home and work from anywhere was also permitted.

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