The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India on Wednesday proposed to impose a fine of up to Rs 20,000 on service providers for non-compliance of its directive regarding unsolicited tele-marketing calls and messages.

The regulator issued a short consultation to amend Telecom Unsolicited Commercial Communications Regulations, 2007, to increase the effectiveness of these regulations by providing some financial sanctions to erring service providers.

After the amendment, if any telecom service provider does not comply with provisions of the Regulations, it would be fined up to Rs 5,000 for the first instance and not more than Rs 20,000 for every subsequent instance, Trai said in a statement.

It also proposed to revise the tariff to be levied from the registered telemarketer to Rs 500 for the first unsolicited call and Rs 1,000 for the second or any subsequent unsolicited call.

Trai, in October 2007, had set up the National Do Not Call registry, under which users can register if they do not want to receive any telemarketing call or message. Despite registration, some users are still receiving such calls. Till date, 7.5 million phone users have registered and 12,183 telemarketers have got themselves registered.

Telemarketing calls have engaged the attention of Parliament, Supreme Court, high courts, the Reserve Bank of India [Get Quote], etc, Trai said, adding that there have also been a number of consumer complaints about telemarketing calls.

"Financial sanctions as an effective deterrent to non-compliance of the Telecom UCC Regulations, 2007 have become a necessity," it said, asking for stakeholders comments by January 23.