The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India released the Telecom Consumer Protection (Thirteenth Amendment) Regulations, 2026 on 21 September 2026, mandating telecom operators to offer a broader range of voice-and-SMS-only Special Tariff Vouchers (STVs), after finding that short-duration, data-free recharge options had become scarce for consumers who do not need bundled data.
Background
TRAI had, through the Telecom Consumer Protection (Twelfth Amendment) Regulations, 2024, first mandated that every telecom service provider offer at least one Special Tariff Voucher exclusively for voice and SMS. Since that amendment's implementation, TRAI observed a limitation in the practical availability of such vouchers: operators tended to offer only a limited number of voice-and-SMS-only STVs, concentrated on longer validity periods, leaving consumers who wanted a shorter-duration, data-free option with few affordable choices. TRAI records that it received representations expressing a need for shorter-duration voice-and-SMS-only packs specifically.
To address the gap, TRAI released the draft Telecom Consumer Protection (Thirteenth Amendment) Regulations, 2026 for consultation on its website on 7 April 2026. The consultation drew 1,132 responses from stakeholders, and TRAI held an Open House Discussion on the consultation paper on 15 June 2026. Based on the stakeholder responses and its own analysis, TRAI finalised the Thirteenth Amendment Regulations on 21 September 2026.
Key provisions
The salient feature of the amendment is a mandate that telecom service providers offer STVs, with appropriate reduction in tariff, exclusively for voice and SMS, covering:
Validity parity with bundled STVs: a voice-and-SMS-only STV corresponding to each validity period of thirty days and less than thirty days that the operator offers for its bundled voice, SMS and data STVs.
A same-date monthly-renewal option: at least one voice-and-SMS-only STV renewable on the same date each month, with the renewal date falling on the last day of the month in any month where that specific date is unavailable.
A longer-validity option: at least one voice-and-SMS-only STV with a validity longer than the two categories above, corresponding to the validity period of bundled STVs offering voice, SMS and data.
TRAI states that this tariff framework is intended to sufficiently address consumer requirements, giving low-income consumers more options to recharge according to their requirements and financial capacity, and improving choices generally for consumers who prefer not to use STVs bundled with data.
Implications for practitioners
For telecom regulatory counsel advising operators, the amendment converts what had been a single-voucher compliance obligation under the Twelfth Amendment Regulations into a structured, validity-matched obligation that tracks an operator's own bundled-STV product catalogue. Because the requirement is defined by reference to whatever validity periods an operator itself chooses to offer for bundled voice-SMS-data STVs, operators cannot satisfy the rule with a static, minimal set of voice-and-SMS-only vouchers; the voice-and-SMS-only catalogue must be reviewed and potentially expanded every time the operator's bundled-STV product range changes. In-house tariff-filing teams should build a standing compliance check into any bundled-STV product launch or validity change, confirming a corresponding voice-and-SMS-only STV exists or is filed concurrently.
The same-date monthly-renewal requirement is a comparatively unusual regulatory design choice worth flagging to operators' billing and IT teams specifically, because it requires system logic to correctly calculate the renewal date across months of varying length — for example, an STV originally activated on the 31st of a month must renew on the last day of a 30-day or 28/29-day month rather than defaulting to a fixed day-count cycle. Billing-system compliance reviews should specifically test this edge case rather than assuming a standard 30-day renewal cycle satisfies the requirement.
More broadly, the amendment is a useful marker of TRAI's evolving approach to tariff-transparency regulation: rather than mandating a fixed minimum number of voice-and-SMS-only vouchers as it did in 2024, the Thirteenth Amendment ties the obligation dynamically to each operator's own bundled-product range, which has the practical effect of preventing operators from narrowing their voice-and-SMS-only offering as a way of steering low-income or data-averse consumers toward higher-value bundled plans. Regulatory and consumer-protection counsel advising both operators and consumer-interest groups should expect TRAI to continue favouring this dynamically-linked drafting technique in future tariff-transparency amendments, since it is comparatively self-enforcing and reduces the need for TRAI to prescribe and periodically update a fixed numerical minimum.
Finally, because the amendment responds directly to a gap that emerged from operators' commercial response to the 2024 rule, compliance counsel should treat this as a precedent for how TRAI monitors and revisits earlier consumer-protection mandates where market behaviour undermines the original policy intent, and should advise clients against structuring minimal, technically-compliant responses to future TRAI consumer-protection mandates, since a narrow compliance posture of this kind is exactly the pattern that prompted this amendment.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are Special Tariff Vouchers (STVs) and why did TRAI amend the rules governing them?
A Special Tariff Voucher is a recharge plan telecom operators offer outside their standard base plans, often bundling voice, SMS and data. TRAI's Telecom Consumer Protection (Thirteenth Amendment) Regulations, 2026, released 21 September 2026, found that after the Twelfth Amendment Regulations of 2024 mandated at least one voice-and-SMS-only STV, operators concentrated their offerings on longer validities, leaving low-income consumers who do not need bundled data with limited affordable short-duration choices.
What must telecom operators now offer under the Thirteenth Amendment Regulations?
Operators must offer voice-and-SMS-only STVs, with appropriate tariff reductions, corresponding to each validity period of thirty days or less that they offer for bundled voice, SMS and data STVs; at least one such STV must be renewable on the same date each month; and at least one STV must be offered with a longer validity matching the corresponding bundled offering.
How many stakeholder responses did TRAI receive before finalising these regulations?
TRAI received 1,132 responses from stakeholders in response to the draft Telecom Consumer Protection (Thirteenth Amendment) Regulations, 2026, which had been released for consultation on 7 April 2026, and also held an Open House Discussion on 15 June 2026 before finalising the amendment on 21 September 2026.