Indian SIM card
 

I know there are a few posts about this already, but they are all a few years old so I want to see if anything has changed.

I will be traveling in U.P. for about two weeks and want to be able to make and receive calls with my cell phone. Previous posts have suggested that the best thing to do is to have my local hosts buy a prepaid SIM card (Airtel? Hutch?) for me. The second option would be to buy one in the airport (Delhi? Lucknow?), but that I need to present a copy of the identity page of my passport and two photographs.

Is all this still true? Any suggestions for the best phone company to use? Would I be able to buy a prepaid SIM in the airport in Lucknow or should I do it in Delhi?

Thanks.

Buying the SIM card at Delhi airport is definitely easiest option (you don't even need the photos, they'll take digital pics), but any phone shop -- and there are, probably literally, millions -- can get you a SIM, so I don't see a reason to trouble your hosts with this. There's little difference between the nationwide operators, but Airtel probably has the best coverage overall.

Yeah not just phone shops. You'll find them sold in drugstores, groceries, supermarkets .. wherever.

Airtel prepaid on arrival into DEL (international) airport is what I generally suggest for such purposes. The Airtel booth for that is right after you exit customs at DEL but before you get to where the hotel drivers are waiting with placards showing their hotel and guest's names.

When I tried to get a SIM in Hyderabad this summer, it was pretty much impossible. They (Airtel, Reliance) asked for proof of residence in India, which I don't have. However, they were willing to issue me one after I used a friend's phone bill, showing address in India.

When I went to Delhi I also tried getting a SIM there. Same story. They wanted to see proof of residence in India.

How exactly is Airtel in DEL issuing these with just your foreign Passport information?

Bizarre. Are you sure you were asking for a prepaid SIM, not a postpaid one? And did you ask in actual Airtel shops or some random mobile phone shop that's never seen a firangi before?

Yup, looking for prepaid SIM. Asked in Airtel showrooms and small local stores. Got the same answers.

My experience was the same. I had to get a friend to get a SIM for me.

That's what I was advised by gracious FTers when I asked about buying a SIM in India. I was already in India, staying with Indians. I did not feel like asking my hosts to do circumvent legal requirements of residence. Occasionally, my hosts would let me borrow of the phones their son had.

Hi, I got my Airtel SIM card at the internaional airport like adviced, no problem there.I suspect I could have gotten away even without the ID photos but the lady at the counter caught sight of the stack of photos I had in the purse so I was 1 shoot poorer.In all, I had to submit
a) proof of residency ( apparently, the address would be best from Delhi) in the form of confirmation letter from hotel.
b) cash (no CC allowed)
c)photo.
And the card cost 500 rupees, non refundable, amount stored also subject to taxes, so for example, if you paid 1000rupees, you only get 900 something value in the card.
but the card was really value for money, we made 20-30 international calls home without depleting the 1000 rupees .

asianmom, that's good to see they accepted the hotel info - that hasn't worked in other locations.

Yaatri - I have a hard time believing this is a sane rule when the phone co. representatives themselves advised me to get friend/relative residency info.

I had to do this in CCU, as they weren't interested in my BOM address.

Further note that when the hotel found out that I went to the phone shop directly (I never knew they had a relationship with each other), a hotel rep condescendingly told me that they could have done it for me - I almost told him to bugger off...

Tried with Airtel at the airport, but then required the passport pix, which I didn't have on me, so I just went to a competing GSM store to see if they had a prepaid SIM I could purchase for my needs.

bombay sim card?
 

I know the thread has talked about Delhi, but i'll be arriving into Mumbai and will be staying at the intercontinental at the airport before i head off to a smaller town in Gujarat. I don't mind buying it in the smaller town, but 1. i want to call home when i get to the hotel, and 2. ill be landing on the night before diwali, so im not sure if the stores will be open.

with a us passport and no proof of indian residency (unless a hotel confirmation will count)....how can i get a sim card?

Are there any locations in the airport (for an international arrival) to buy a sim? Do they sell them at the intercontinental hotel? Do i need to show anything?

I am interested in this also, we will be arriving in Mumbai in oarly Oct and travelling to Anand, we definitely like to know the best way to get a pre-paid SIM on arrival.

Thanks!

Jeff

I'm bumping this old thread to see if anyone has some more recent encounters with purchasing SIM cards upon arrival in Delhi. My family is going to visit various cities across the country and we will all have unlocked phones we just need SIM cards that will work to call back to the US and call each other preferably for cheap and also if possible connect with a BIS or some other data connection.

What should we bring with us when we get to India to make this process easy?

Thanks for your help.