Airtel Discontinues Rs. 23 Prepaid Recharge, Now Offering Rs. 45 as Base Plan

Airtel has issued a public notice that the base recharge plan of Rs. 23 is being discontinued for prepaid users in all circles, and is being replaced by the Rs. 45 prepaid plan. This means a 95 percent price hike has been introduced on the base plan. This new price is already live in all circles, and the telecom operator has reportedly issued a notice in all major newspapers across India. The Rs. 45 prepaid recharge will offer the same benefits as the Rs. 23 prepaid plan.

The new public notice states that the new Rs. 45 Airtel smart recharge will offer local and STD voice calling at 2.5paise per second, 5 paise per second for national video calls, and 50 paise per MB for data. SMS tariff is at rupee 1 per SMS for local, Rs. 1.5 per SMS for national, and Rs. 5 per SMS for international messages. The validity of the new Rs. 45 plan is 28 days. These are the same benefits as the Rs. 23 prepaid recharge plan that has now been discontinued. The revised pricing is now live on the Airtel Thanks app and the website as well. It was first reported by DreamDTH.

The notice reads, “This notice is for Prepaid subscribers of Bharti Airtel Limited and Bharti Hexacom Limited (‘Airtel') in all service areas. With effect from 29th December 2019, the existing SUK base plan is being discontinued. Further, it will be mandatory to recharge with a voucher of Rs 45 or above, every 28 days to avail services…. In case of non-recharge with a voucher of Rs 45 of above, all services will be suspended post the grace period.”

The grace period mentioned in the notice is of up to 15 days. After the completion of the grace period, if the subscriber fails to do a Rs. 45 recharge, then the services will be suspended. Also, if the subscriber recharges with another STV/Combo/Top-up voucher priced more than or equal to Rs 45, then the validity of the tariff plan will be extended with the validity of Combo/STV Voucher recharged.