Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) holds consumer outreach programme in West Jaintia Hills

SHILLONG: With an objective to safeguard the interest of the consumers and to create consumer awareness Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Regional Office Kolkata yesterday organised a Consumer Outreach Programme at Nongtalang College, Nongtalang, West Jaintia Hills district, Meghalaya. The main objective of the programme was to apprise the public about various initiatives taken by TRAI to safeguard consumer interests. 

Ms. G. Shabong, CCA, NE-I, Department of Telecom highlighted the importance of organising this type of awareness events in remote places and faraway places like Nongtalang. She exhorted the students to come forward and feel free to voice their opinion and problems about network connectivity during the program so that the problems may be addressed effectively. 

Shri D. Pandey, SDPO, Amlarem in his address, requested the student community present in the event to come up with their honest feedback about the network connectivity in this area. Such genuine feedback would help TRAI and other stakeholders to address the problems.

Dr. Ryan Reid Kharkongor, Principal, Nongtalang College, Nongtalang while addressing the session, appreciated the effort undertaken by the TRAI in arranging such an awareness program for the benefit of the local people of a remote village like Nongtalang. He highlighted the importance of good mobile connectivity in the college area and requested the service providers to maintain good connectivity in future. He expressed concern over the limited availability of the mobile network in the area and lack of fixed line connectivity. 

During the programme, through a detailed presentation by Shri Debjit Saha, SRO, TRAI, participants were educated about the provisions of different consumer centric regulations, directions and orders relating to Value Added Services (VAS), Unsolicited Commercial Communications (UCC), Mobile Number Portability (MNP), Complaint Redressal Mechanism, Data services and Tariff etc. 

Participants were also informed about the benefits of various Mobile apps (TRAI MySpeed app, TRAI DND 3.0 app and TRAI Mycall app), Tariff portal and Network coverage maps developed by TRAI for consumer empowerment and how consumers can take advantage of these apps /portal. Participants were also briefed on various recommendations made by TRAI to facilitate growth of telecommunication and about TRAI’s new regulations and directions on UCC and how they should be extra careful about different telecom fraud like tower fraud, fraudulent message/ calls etc. 

A presentation on cyber crime and cyber security measures was also given by Shri D. Pandey, SDPO, Amlarem, Meghalaya Police highlighting the do’s and dont’s on the part of the citizens to safeguard themselves from falling prey to cyber crime related traps. 

A presentation on USOF projects, including BharatNet and 4G Saturation projects in the State of Meghalaya was presented by Shri A. Das from the office of the Controller of Communication Accounts (CCA), TRAI. The presentation showed the progress status of the USOF projects in this state. 

Shri Ashim Dutta, Joint Advisor, TRAI presented on the subject of Sanchar Saathi portal (sancharsaathi.gov.in), a citizen centric portal developed by DOT. The presentation dealt with various tools such as ‘Chakshu’ (fraud communication), CEIR (lost or stolen mobile), TAFCOP (No. of mobile connections) etc., which are part of Sanchar Saathi portal. 

The presentation was followed by a lively interactive session wherein participants’ queries related to various aspects of telecom services were responded to by the TRAI team. (PIB)

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