Sikkim: Centre makes Nepali mandatory in telecom services

Gangtok: The Union government has made Nepali mandatory in all Sikkim-based telecom services.

The instruction was issued on Tuesday by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) under the Ministry of Communications.

As per the guidelines, all telecom service providers would have to us Nepali in customer care operations, SMS alerts, and interactive voice response systems (IVRS).

The official memorandum endorsed by Rakesh Yadav, Assistant Wireless Advisor (Licensing Policy), underlines that move aims at making sure subscribers in Sikkim can interact with service providers in Nepali, widely spoken in the state.

Nepali is the lingua franca of Sikkim.

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The directive also gives guidelines to telecom operators, internet service providers (ISPs), and virtual network operators (VNOs) to introduce Nepali with English and Hindi.

Telecom operators have to implement the changes within 30 days of the notification and also share compliance reports to the Licensed Service Area (LSA) office.

Subscribers should start receiving telecom-related communications in Nepali by early October 2025.