112 to be India’s Single Emergency Number

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has approved a proposal by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), stating that there will soon be a single emergency number in India.The existing numbers are – 100, 101, 102 and 108. These will exist for a period of one year before being re-routed to a single emergency number 112.

“These numbers will be closed in a phased manner (following a public awareness campaign),” said the DoT.

This number will be accessible to all, even those who do not have a GPS enabled cellphone. However, reportedly, DoT has suggested the telecom regulator to study the impact of enabling all mobile phones with GPS before finalizing the view.

A statement issued by the TRAI mentioned that they would soon be finalizing a date for the incorporation of GPS on all mobile phones in order to have a more accurate location information. Until this works out, we’ll still have to remember a set of numbers.