Prashant Sharma had been toying with the idea of going mobile for quite sometime, but was reluctant to take the plunge.

Though he had decided to go for a prepaid connection, he found the handsets expensive and choosing one from the numerous tariff plans daunting.

Now things have become a lot easier for Sharma with more players turning their attention to the pre-paid market.

Reliance Infocomm's Reliance India Mobile prepaid scheme offers latest handsets and as many as 20 free recharge vouchers with a prepaid connection. In effect, the price of the handset works out to as low as Rs 20.

For example, for Rs 3,500, Reliance Infocomm is offering a Motorola C131 handset and 10 recharge coupons totally worth Rs 3,240. So, the net price works out to Rs 260.

Similarly, for Rs 6,500, the company is offering 20 recharge coupons (totally worth Rs 6,480) with a Nokia 2280 or LG RD 2030 models. So the net price of these models works out to Rs 20. Reliance Infocomm is also offering colour handsets and a wrist watch model under similar packages.

"We have sold over 300,000 connections in the first two weeks of our launch. And this is only in the top 111 cities of the country," said a Reliance Infocomm spokesman. "We are rapidly expanding to smaller towns and expect subscriptions to shoot up," he said.

Some dealers are offering the RIM package for as low as Rs 1,500, but without the free recharge vouchers.

"The handsets available under the RIM scheme are a big crowd puller. Getting a handset was an entry barrier. Now, with Reliance offering handsets with its prepaid offering for as little as Rs 3,500, things have become easier for new subscribers," says a dealer of RIM Prepaid scheme in Mumbai.

The package is available in several retail outlets and R-World shops across the country.

"A majority of the RIM prepaid customers are new to the prepaid segment. About 40 per cent of our customers have switched from GSM networks," the dealer said.

Officials of BPL Mobile and Orange refused to comment on the impact of Reliance Infocomm's entry into the prepaid segment on their sales.

But there is a catch in the RIM Prepaid scheme. The handsets on offer work on CDMA (code division multiple access) technology and can be used only with Reliance Infocomm's service. So, if you want to change the telecom service provider, you will have to procure a new handset.

Earlier, Bharti Cellular's Airtel had launched a similar scheme where it offered a Motorola C 201 handset (costing Rs 3,246) for Rs 1,947 and a Samsung R 220 set (costing Rs 4,198) for Rs 2,999 with its prepaid connection.

BPL Mobile and Orange offer the SIM card (prepaid connection) for Rs 99, but the handset has to be procured separately. These handsets can be used for any GSM service provider.

The first two or four free RIM Prepaid vouchers (depending on the handset) are pre-loaded. Each of these vouchers offers a talk time of Rs 200 and are valid for a month.

One has to recharge the card either when the talk time has exhausted or when the card's validity is over. The balance talktime can be carried forward by using another recharge voucher.

Reliance Infocomm also offers recharge coupons in denominations of Rs 540 (talk time of Rs 375) and Rs 1,080 (talk time of Rs 850).

"This is another attractive feature of our offer. While other operators give a talk time of Rs 150 on their recharge cards worth Rs 342, we are offering a talk time of Rs 200," the RIM spokesperson said. "We plan to launch recharge vouchers in other denominations depending on the demand," he said.

However, all the free vouchers must be used within six months. On completion of the six months, there is a grace period of six months when one can receive calls and SMS without recharging. However, calls cannot be made in this period.

The recharge vouchers can be used for local calls, STD/STD calls, SMS and to access R World (free till June 30, 2004) and the Internet through R Connect.

"Reliance is the only service provider allowing access to advanced services under the R World and R Connect platforms. However, the Motorola C131 handset does not support these features." the spokesperson said.

While the airtime charges are more or less the same for all prepaid offerings, RIM Prepaid is the only card where roaming is preactivated -- one does not have to activate/deactivate the facility.

Also, there is no roaming rental or airtime charge. As with other telecom operators, one needs a proof of residence and identity to get a prepaid card connection.