BPL Mobile, Escotel, RPG Cellular and Spice Telecom today slashed long-distance tariffs for their 3 million mobile users by 30 per cent to Rs 4.50 per minute, the cheapest at present.

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd recently brought down long-distance rates to Rs 4.80 per minute.

As per the new tariffs announced by the four cellular operators under the MobileFirst Alliance umbrella, outgoing tariffs for cell-to-cell calls have, however, gone up over 30 per cent.

This is because the telecommunications regulator has imposed a terminating charge of 30 paise a minute on cell-to-cell calls under the new interconnection norms.

Earlier, cellular users paid only the access charges for calling fixed-line and limited mobility subscribers.

For pre-paid card users, local outgoing calls are being offered at Rs 3 a minute. Earlier, they paid Rs 2.40 per minute for calling cellular subscribers and Rs 3.60 for calling fixed-line or limited mobility users.

Long-distance calls for pre-paid card users is also 25 per cent cheaper at Rs 4 a minute for calls less than 200 km and Rs 5 a minute for calls over 200 km. Earlier, the rates were Rs 4.80 and Rs 7.20, respectively.

These tariffs are, however, still higher than the limited mobility tariffs announced by Reliance and Tata Teleservices.

For instance, outgoing local calls for Tata Teleservices' subscribers ranges from 80 paise a minute to Re 1 per minute on a rental of Rs 295.

In comparison, Mobile First has two plans with rentals of Rs 399 and Rs 599 offering calls at Rs 2 a minute and Rs 1.20 a minute, respectively.