State Rajya Sabha member Raghav Chadha has said that under the new rules announced by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), prepaid mobile users will now be able to get only plans that offer 30-day recharge, voice calling, and SMS facilities.
He noted that these changes have been introduced in response to the questions he raised in Parliament earlier this year.
In this regard, he has released a video post on the X platform. In it, he said, “There are 12 months in a year. But prepaid users have to recharge 13 times. Why should one recharge once every 28 days? Plans should be introduced with validity for 30 days.
There are many consumers who prefer plans that offer only voice calling facilities without data. For them, prepaid plans with incoming and outgoing calling facilities will be introduced,” he said.
The Telecom Consumer Protection (13th Amendment) Regulations, 2026 were notified by TRAI on September 22. This amendment expands special recharge plans that offer only voice calling and SMS facilities.
This includes plans with a validity of 30 days or less, as well as plans that are automatically renewed on the same date every month.
Under the new amendment, telecom service providers must also offer short-duration voice call and SMS-only plans included in bundled recharge plans at correspondingly lower prices. These regulations were formulated only after consultations that received feedback from 1,132 stakeholders.
Through this, the amendment will greatly help consumers such as senior citizens and low-budget users who do not need data services and use their phones only for incoming and outgoing calls, said Raghav Chadha.
TRAI’s new rules for recharge plans that include only voice calls and SMS have been formulated based on its previous framework.
The regulator has now defined such recharge packs as prepaid plans that offer only voice calling and SMS facilities without data, for users who do not need internet service.
Raghav Chadha noted that this incident shows how issues raised by elected public representatives, with public support, turn into regulatory action.
"This is an excellent example of constructive politics. I hope such efforts to find solutions to the real problems people face will continue," he said
