The iPhone 3G will be available as early as next month in India reports Techtree. As we had reported earlier, the phone was expected sometime in October from both Vodafone and Airtel. The report indicates an earlier launch date of August. Moreover, Vodafone will enjoy a 15-day first-to-market window in India. The early release for Vodafone is thanks to a world-wide deal between Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and Vodafone (NYSE: VOD).

The 8GB variant is slated to be released first. What’s available for $200 in the U.S. is expected to be priced between Rs. 11,500 and Rs. 12,000. This does not include the data rates, of course, details on which are not due until mid-August.

While on the price, the total-cost of an iPhone has been an point of debate: while it is true that the entry-price for the cell phone has decreased, AT&T (NYSE: T) has actually increased data rates for web surfing (to $30 for 3G, from $20 originally charged for the iPhone) and SMS ($5 to match the original’s 200 message plan), which has led to a total-cost-of-ownership that is actually $160 more than the original iPhone.

While similar data on Indian pricing is not available, we could assume the Indian carriers taking a leaf out of the AT&T policy.

What about 3G? Availability on the high-speed cellular network is still a nebulous ‘sometime this year’. It certainly looks a distance away, it was recently reported by BusinessWeek that rollout might happen as late as the first quarter of 2009. It would be interesting to see the impact of the iPhone 3G without the 3G connectivity, since most of the third-party applications that make the iPhone so useful, directly leverage the speeds made available through 3G.

Speaking of third-party, while the App Store is already available in India via iTunes, the pricing is still at international standards (read: expensive, compared to free)

• Airtel To Launch 3G iPhone In October