The Hindu Business Line : Telecom players blame Govt agencies for roll-out delay

TELECOM operators have blamed the lack of adequate spectrum and delay in getting clearances by the various government agencies for failing to fulfil the roll-out obligation under the Unified Access Services Licence agreement.

At a meeting with the Department of Telecom, the operators said that agencies such as the Wireless and Planning Co-ordination cell (WPC), a unit of DoT which monitors spectrum allocation, had delayed giving the necessary clearance and therefore the services could not be launched within the stipulated time.

DoT is in the process of slapping a Rs 406-crore fine on seven telecom operators including Reliance Infocomm, Tata Teleservices, Bharti Cellular and Essar Hutchison for failing to roll out telecom services in 10 per cent of each district headquarters within the first year of operations. As per the licence agreement, each UASL operator is required to get a certificate from the Telecom Engineering Centre (TEC), the standards unit of DoT, once the network is rolled out. DoT has found out that the 7 operators have not complied with the norms.

Operators, however, said the delay in rolling out services has been due to the fact that the WPC had not given the Standing Advisory Committee on Frequency Allocation clearance in time without which they could not get the radio frequency required to launch cellular services. They also said the TEC testing guidelines i.e. test schedules and procedures for CDMA operators were released only a month before the completion of the one-year deadline set by DoT.

"So even if the operators network covers 10 per cent of a district headquarters within a year of obtaining the license, the TEC testing may get delayed due to the procedures and multiple approvals and clearances involved as a pre-requisite to applying for TEC certification," said an operator.

Some of the operators had applied for clearances as early as June 2004, but the TEC certification came only by December 2004.