Bharti Airtel finally blinked. Pinched hard by the lower tariff plans of rivals, the country’s largest telecom player on Friday joined the per-second billing battle in hopes of recharging growth, seen faltering after a lacklustre second-quarter reporting hours earlier shaved almost 7 per cent off its intra-day share price. Under the new plan, prepaid mobile subscribers will be charged 1 paisa per second for all local and STD calls to Airtel numbers and 1.20 paise per second for local and STD calls to other networks. It has been a worrying few months for Bharti. On a sequential basis, the company for the first time posted a 7.8 per cent decline in net profit at Rs 2,321 crore, compared with Rs 2,517 crore in the first quarter. On a year-on-year basis, net profit rose 13 per cent. Revenues during the period rose 9 per cent at Rs 9,846 crore on a yearly basis, but fell 0.97 per cent against Rs 9,941 crore in Q1.