Indian SIM cards to use in my mobile phone

Hey everyone, newbie here.

Myself and some friends are off to India later this month. We are going for 2 weeks and will be staying in Bangalore, Pune and Chennai for the majority of the trip, with in and around Chennai being where we will be spending the most time.

We will, undoubtably, get split up everynow and then, and be going off in groups to do different things so we were thinking about getting a SIM card for a local network to put in our phones while we are over there so we can call each other at local rates.

Does anyone know how easy this will be? Should we really arrange this before we travel? (I have looked into it but seems expensive - £45 / $100 for a SIM card!) Or are they available to buy out there?

Is there anything I need to be aware of? It seemed when I was looking into this that if you buy a SIM card in one region, you may be charged more for your calls when in another region? Also, how much would calls back to the UK cost using Indian SIMs? Would it be advisable to use them for this or is there a better alternative for calling home?

Any advice / tips anyone can give me on this matter will be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Regards

UK Paul

Sorry guys,

Just noticed the sticky at the top of the page. Unless their is anything extra I need to know, I will just get the info from there!

Buying a local SIM card should not be a problem at all. You will require two passport size photo, even for PAYG cards. Make sure you keep your SIM when you come back to the UK, or destroy them.