The Hindu Business Line : Roll-out obligations for new mobile operators may be relaxed

The Communications and IT Minister, Mr A. Raja, on Tuesday said that the roll-out conditions at the end of first year of operations as stipulated in the licence may be removed as none of the new players are close to achieving it.

Mobile operators are required to cover at least 10 per cent of each district headquarters within the first year of getting the licence. However, delays in getting spectrum have forced almost all the operators to push back their launch dates. So instead of the one-year roll-out obligation, new players will only have to offer complete coverage in a circle over a three-year period. In an earlier instance, the Department of Telecom had asked a cellular operator to roll out fixed line services to meet the roll-out conditions.

Mr Raja said the Government has also referred the proposal to impose a three-year lock-in period on the promoters of the new telecom against companies to the telecom regulator. “I have sent the proposal to TRAI as it may involve changes in the license conditions,” Mr Raja said at the Economic Editors’ conference here.

Termination charges

In another relief to the new players, he said that termination charges should be reduced from the existing level of 30 paise a minute. Termination charge is a fee paid by the operator on whose network the call originates to the operator on whose network the call terminates. Since existing operators own the subscribers, new players will more often be the one paying out the termination fee. “I feel that termination charges should come down. We have asked TRAI’s recommendations on a priority basis,” Mr Raja said.

While new players will benefit from lower termination charges, it will also enable lower mobile tariffs for consumers.

The Minister said DoT was actively considering increasing revenue from various sources. “The licence fee and spectrum charges of more than Rs 55,000 crore have been collected since 2003 when the UASL regime came into effect. Every year telecom revenues are growing by about 15 per cent. In addition, the Telecom Commission has taken a decision for increasing annual spectrum charges for 2G Spectrum. This decision, when implemented, will realise additional revenue of about Rs 1,200 crore per year,” he said.

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