The Hindu Business Line : Regulator, DoT divided over key policy issues

Missives
TRAI has written 2 letters to DoT in last one month on policy differences.
Against auctioning 10 Mhz spectrum per operator for 3G, suggests 5 Mhz.

Our Bureau

New Delhi, Nov. 21 It’s not just the mobile operators who are at loggerheads with each other; the Department of Telecom and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India are also divided over key policy issues. TRAI has shot off two letters to the DoT in the last one month pointing out that the policy decisions were contrary to its recommendations.

For instance, TRAI has told the Government that the decision to issue new licences for third-generation services was a deviation from the regulator’s recommendations. In a letter to DoT, the telecom regulator said that as per its recommendations, 3G mobile services did not require a new licence but was allowed under the existing unified access services licence.

TRAI also pointed out that it had come to know of the Government’s decisions through a press release and had not received any official communication from DoT informing them of the policy decision. On November 12, the Ministry of Communication had unveiled the 3G policy wherein the Government would conduct an auction to award the licence. As per the policy, even new Indian players and foreign telecom majors would be allowed to bid.

The telecom regulator has also expressed its opposition to auction 10 Mhz spectrum per operator for 3G mobile services. TRAI said that it was in favour of allocating only 5 Mhz per operator as it would enable more number of operators to compete.

‘Issues linked’

In another letter, TRAI had said that the Government’s decisions for 2G mobile spectrum were not fully in line with the recommendations of the regulator. TRAI said that the Government could not pick and choose from the recommendations as all the issues were linked with each other.

The regulator had given its views on capping mobile operators, spectrum management, and mergers and acquisition among others. However, DoT had not accepted TRAI’s recommendations on mergers and acquisition and has also made changes on spectrum issues.

For example, while TRAI said that companies which have both GSM and CDMA spectrum should pay charges based on the combined radio frequency, DoT decided to impose the fee separately.