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The Government expects to raise about Rs 1,733 crore from auctions of the third phase FM radio licences, the Information and Broadcasting Minister, Ms Ambika Soni said.
The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the third phase FM expansion, which extends FM radio services to about 227 new cities with a population of over one lakh. The phase three expansion will result in a total of 839 FM stations across 294 cities.
AIR news bulletins can be carried
The Cabinet also approved increase in FDI and FII limit in private FM radio broadcasting company to 26 per cent from the present 20 per cent.
According to the new policy, radio operators have been permitted to carry news bulletins of All India Radio.
e-auctions
Ms Soni said the Government has taken the e-auction route to auction the FM radio channels. E-auctions will be conducted in batches and the number of batches will be decided by the I&B Ministry, depending upon the response from the bidders after the auction of first batch.
The Government will appoint an independent expert agency to conduct the e-auction. A notice inviting applications for participation in the auctions will be issued in due course of time.
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