The Hindu Business Line : Cellular operators may withdraw WLL case

THE Cellular Operators Association of India is likely to withdraw the WLL case from the Supreme Court in the wake of the Government working out a financial package for the cellular industry.

The association held an emergency meeting today on the issue, according to industry sources. The compensation package being worked out by the Finance Ministry could come in the form of reduction in revenue share, they said.

Currently, the cellular operators pay a revenue share of 12 per cent for metro and A circles, 10 per cent for B circles and 8 per cent for C circles, and the compensation may come in the form of reduction in this fee to the tune of two to four per cent.

However, the private basic operators who have opted for the unified access service licence have said that they would oppose any move to grant financial compensation to the GSM cellular operators.

In a statement they noted that after a long process of consultation, the telecom regulator decided to unify all licences with a view to creating a level playing, technologically neutral field to achieve the objectives as laid by the National Telecom Policy `99. Basic services operators were given an option to pay an additional migration fee to the new universal access service regime, which permits them to offer fully mobile services. The migration/equalisation fee as payable by basic operators was benchmarked against the licence fee paid by the fourth GSM operator in each circle. Logically, the fee should have been lower had the Government taken the bidding route for the 5th and 6th cellular service licence, they said.

The basic service operators agreed to pay migration fess to the tune of Rs 2,100 crore under the impression that the regulations/consideration from now on would be same for all mobile service operators irrespective of the technology/chronological order for procuring licence.

Now the Government is considering granting a concession in the revenue sharing fees to be paid by the mobile operators using the GSM technology, they added.

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