One of India’s large mobile operators, Bharti Airtel has announced a new limited-time offer for it’s prepaid users in Delhi which would allow them free roaming in five states across the country. With the new plan, Airtel prepaid subscribers would be able to enjoy free incoming calls in the states of Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Uttrakhand and West Bengal (except Kolkata).

Airtel prepaid subscribers in Delhi can enjoy this service at just Rs.21 with a validity period of 30 days. Presently, the users are charged Re. 1 for incoming calls, Re. 1 for local outgoing calls and Rs. 1.5 for STD calls while on roaming. 

In a statement, Airtel said, 

With this new service, Airtel has become the second mobile operator in the country to offer free roaming. Earlier this year in January, Aircel has also launched a new plan named as ‘One Nation, One Rate’ which abolished roaming charges for users on it’s network.

Unlike Airtel’s plan which just offers free incoming calls, Aircel’s free roaming plan is available for Rs.39 in Delhi and offers the same rate to the users in their home circle as well as while on roaming. Aircel’s plan offers Local/National Voice calls at 1 paisa/second in the customer’s home circle as well as while roaming on Aircel network. All incoming calls while roaming on Aircel network will be free and users would have to pay Re 1/SMS (Local/National) both, in home circle as well as while roaming and the data plan which the user has subscribed to, would be applicable while roaming as well.

These new plans from operators like Airtel and Aircel might be their attempt to cash-in some revenue before the national-wide roaming becomes free, which is expected to happen by October this year.