London, May 8: Global roaming charges for mobile telephones are to be slashed, initially for Europe by as much as 40 per cent, it was announced today by Arun Sarin, the Indian-origin chief executive of Vodafone.

Eventually, charges in India will come down, too, from the typical current rate of 60 pence to receive a call in India on a UK-based mobile or an astronomic ?1.20 to make one from India.

But tariffs in India are already among the lowest in the world. The Vodafone move is unlikely to have an immediate impact in India, telecom industry sources in Delhi said.

Sarin, who seems to have beaten off critics inside Vodafone who want to oust him, has responded to pressure from European regulators to cut costs for global roaming.

Last year, Sarin, 52, bought 10 per cent of Sunil Mittal’s Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd for $1.5 billion.

With a growing number of Indian professionals going abroad on business, it is important that they feel free to use their Indian mobiles while overseas. Similarly, westerners coming to India on work would benefit from the substantial reduction in rates that now seems likely to take effect within a year.

Vodafone, the world’s biggest operator, promised that the average cost to its customers for calls in Europe would fall from more than 61p a minute to less than 37.7p a minute by next April.

Some NRIs who travel to India frequently have been forced to invest in a second mobile purchased in India but it would obviously be convenient to have only one handset with all the necessary numbers stored in its memory.

Vodafone’s announcement comes six weeks after the European Commission warned that it planned to force mobile phone companies to cancel extra charges for calls abroad.

EU Telecom commissioner Viviane Reding pledged to act after evidence of glaring roaming charge differences and “staggering” rates in some cases.

In March, Reding had unveiled a plan to get rid of the high charges levied by mobile phone companies on using phones abroad, saying: “It is unacceptable that consumers are punished in their phone bill just for crossing a border within the EU.”

The commission’s proposal would see the cost of local and international calls reduced to the same level they would pay at home. This looks like being the principle that will be adopted for mobile phone use in important emerging markets such as India.

Vodafone chief executive Sarin said: “The European Commission and European Parliament have made it clear that they expect to see change. Our announcement today shows that the market, led by Vodafone, is meeting those expectations by providing what our customers tell us they want.”

It plans reciprocal wholesale pricing agreements with other operators in a move the company believes will lead to lower prices across Europe. It is proposing to offer rivals an average charge for roaming on its European subsidiary networks of no more than 30.8p a minute, down from an average wholesale rate of 47.9p a minute.

The offer is conditional, however, upon the requesting mobile network operator offering an identical average charge to Vodafone.