Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, TRAI, released a new consultation paper on Efficient Utilization of Numbering Resources. The previously proposed National Numbering Plan (NNP) 2003 was planned to take care of Mobile Numbering needs for the next 30 years and for around 750 Million subscribers in India. Telecom industry in India is steadily growing much faster than expected, resulting in shortage of Numbering system to the connections.

We already crossed 400 Million telecom subscribers ^[1] in February 2009 and are expected to cross 529 Million subscribers by the end of 2010 ^[2]. If this trend continues to grow India may cross the 750 Million limit much sooner (by 2014) than expected. But the change in numbering would involve added costs and maybe inconvenient to the end users. TRAI and Stakeholders are now to share view points on whether to continue with the existing 10 digitnumbering plan or migrate to 11 digit for fixed as well as mobile connections. But for Long term benefit, it would be better to take some action rather than planning at the last moment.