The Hindu Business Line : Mobile operators oppose mandatory roll-out obligation

New Delhi April 9 The GSM-based cellular operators for a change have joined hands with their rival CDMA-based operators in asking the Government to do away with the roll-out obligations. In a joint representation to the Department of Telecom, the Cellular Operators Association of India and the Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India have asked the Government to rethink on the penalty proposed on the operators for not fulfilling their roll-out obligation.

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 unified access service regime (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, however, found out that the seven operators have not complied with the norms.

`Competitive segment'

However, cellular operators said that there should not be any mandatory roll-out. "The mobile industry is the most competitive segment within telecom and has, in fact, the least requirement of a mandatory roll out-obligation. It is, therefore, surprising that while roll-out obligations have been removed as a requirement for other segments like national and international long distance, these continue to be prescribed for access service providers, who, in fact, are the only service providers contributing to the growth of tele-density in India," said the letter written on April 3.

Operators also pointed out that the industry is facing problems in completing the stipulated roll-out obligations, including delays in getting clearances from various Government agenciesThe operators also said that the condition of 90 per cent in-building coverage is an unrealistic condition and is practically impossible to achieve.

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