The Hindu Business Line : GSM operators pull out of Govt’s spectrum panel

New Delhi, Dec. 7 The chances of a resolution between the Government and existing GSM operators on spectrum allocation have further diminished with the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) on Friday withdrawing from the committee set up by the Communication Ministry to review the subscriber-based criteria.

The COAI, which represents interests of companies such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar and Idea Cellular, said that it was withdrawing from the deliberations because the committee had a pre-determined mindset.

“To our deep dismay, the committee has either completely ignored our submissions or has cherry picked our inputs and applied its own assumptions to arrive at incorrect conclusions without affording us any opportunity to refute them.

“Under these circumstances, I am taken aback at your decision yesterday (December 6) that, at the next meeting on December 10, the proceedings of the committee would be concluded and the recommendations finalised and issued,” said a letter to the panel’s Chairman from Mr T.V. Ramachandran of COAI.

The panel, comprising experts from Indian Institute of Technology and the industry, was set up after GSM operators raised concerns on implementing the enhanced subscriber based criteria prescribed by the Telecom Engineering Centre (TEC).

If the Government implements this norm, the existing GSM operators would not get any additional spectrum for another few years till they reach the prescribed subscriber base, which is up to 15 times the existing numbers.

Sources said the COAI move pre-empts a decision from the panel, which is likely to support the TEC norms. The GSM operators are also miffed that the Department of Telecom on Thursday went ahead and gave permission to Reliance Communication to offer dual technology despite objections from them.

Earlier the GSM operators had also rejected a compromise formula proposed by DoT, which offered to allocate spectrum based on the subscriber base suggested by the telecom regulator instead of TEC.

All eyes in the telecom sector will now be on the proceedings at the Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellate Tribunal on December 12.