Eventhough the Cellular (Mobile) Phones were introduced in 1983, It was only on July 1995, the mobile network was introduced In India. The first commercial cellphone and service launch was in July 1995 — so we were quite a few years behind at the time. It was a partnership between the Modi Group and Australian telecom operator Telstra that brought the first cellular network to India.
At that time, the cost of a phone call was Rs.60/per minute. Only the rich people had cellular phones. But the plot twisted in 1998. The tariff went down to Rs.12 to 18 which was considered low at that time. Additional charge of Rs. 12 was made if you “receive” a call. The first Indian ringtone was Saare Jahaan Se Acha. The mobile giant, Nokia introduced its 5110 model phone and it became very popular all over India. It had 6 colours with interchangeable back and front panels. This phone had a battery attached with the back panel.
Nokia 5110
It had a long antenna and it can be folded. This was not just a phone, but a member in every owner’s family. I can proudly say that my father’s first phone was this one and he had a Orange colour phone. The snake game became addicted to anyone who plays it aleast once. Soon this phone became the largest selling mobile all over the world including India.
Nokia 3310
The upgraded version of this phone was released on 2001 and it had a internal antenna and it was small and compact compared to the older version. Soon the rate of cell phones and network tariffs went down and it became a major blow for Pagers. Eventually Motorolla, stoped manufacturing Pagers in 2003 and started releasing phones in India. In the same year, Nokia 3310 was released and the antenna was placed inside the phone. This was light in weight compared to Nokia 5110.
After that Nokia was placed first in India’s most trusted mobile brand continuously for 12 years.
19 Years of Nokia
Nokia too has completed 19 years in India and here is a quick snapshot of their achievements.
1995 – First mobile phone call made in India on a Nokia
phone on a Nokia network
1998 – Saare Jahaan Se Acchha, first Indian ringtone in
a Nokia 5110
2000 – First phone with Hindi menu (Nokia 3210)
2002 – First Camera phone (Nokia 7650)
2003 – First Made for India phone, Nokia 1100
2004 – Saral Mobile Sandesh, Hindi SMS on a wide range
of Nokia phones
2004 – First Wi-fi Phone- Nokia Communicator (N9500)
2005 – Local UI in additional local language
2006 – Nokia manufacturing plant in Chennai
2007 – First vernacular news portal
After the entry of Samsung and Apple, Nokia lost a lot of revenue and the Manufacturing unit in Chennai was sealed by the Madras High Court. Atlast, all the shares of Nokia were bought by Microsoft a year ago.
Even if technology advances, none of the Indian cannot forget Nokia.
After 2010’s 95% percent of the black and white phones weren’t released. And the evolution takes new direction as the time goes by.
India had only 5 million mobile subscribers in 1998. But today we have more than 920 million mobile subscribers in our country making it the Second largest mobile users after China.
This is the only field where we cannot expect what will happen in the future. Before 2010, no one knows about tablets. Before 2007, no one knows about I-phone. So who knows what would happen in the future.
Vaibhavahini 