SIMmering heat

With multiple SIM card mobiles, it is like being at many places at the same time.

It took just half a decade to practically replace the good ol' landline phones with mobiles handsets. So much so that the first thought on seeing a fixed line number these days is 'Oh no, another tele-caller'. Mobile became our alter ego — that too divided into a professional and otherwise with people having two phones. But now, dual-SIM phones have cut down even on that — one mobile, double identity.

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"This is a boon, I must say," says bank employee Abinash Das. "I have been able to cut down on unwanted calls." Dual SIM phones doesn't hamper your calls, but just notifies that there's something on the 'other line' too.And so it's a hit among youngsters. "I often talk late into the night with my friends," says MBA student Prachi Sinha. "But my parents never get my phone whenever they call, thanks to the other SIM," she laughs.

What dual SIMs have done is that people can now have mobile connections of different companies in one phone according to the plans that suit them. "You may like the call tariff of one company and the SMS plan of other," says Baibhav Shastri, CEO, Zen Mobiles. "Now you can have both, that too in one phone."

More the merrier
A move over dual-SIM, now we even have the triple-SIM mobile phones - the Olive Wiz being. "This is giving more choices to the users," says Arun Khanna, CEO, Olive Telecommunications, who feels that multiple SIMs are "great for professionals and people travelling a lot". "Three SIMs also mean that it's great for low income groups too as the connections are not expensive," adds Khanna.