The Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd employees’ union has raised concerns over telecom regulator TRAI’s recent proposal on spectrum saying that it favoured private telecom companies.

The Sanchar Nigam Executive Association (SNEA), in a letter to Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, has said that TRAI’s recommendation asking BSNL to surrender 1.2 MHz of spectrum in the premium 900 MHz band was contrary to the company’s interest.

“The recommendation of TRAI asking BSNL to surrender 1.2 MHz in the 900 MHz band is denounced and condemned by this association. We are confident that policy-makers and owners of country’s prestigious and strategic telecom company will not allow the last nail in the coffin of BSNL.

“BSNL has to grow at any cost and its growth is extremely critical from a largely national perspective,” the SNEA said in the letter.

The 900 MHz spectrum band is more efficient and cost effective than the 1800 MHz band. Spectrum in the 900 MHz band was allocated to operators who took licences before 2000 for 20 years. Some of these licences are up for renewal this year. But the Government has taken a decision that there will be no automatic renewal and operators will have to buy back the spectrum through the auction route. The problem is that in the 900 MHz band, only the spectrum held by the incumbent players is available for the auction.

This puts immense pressure on operators as they will have to win back this spectrum to ensure business continuity. BSNL, being a state-run operator, has been exempted from giving up its spectrum in the 900 MHz band but TRAI has proposed to take back 1.2 MHz spectrum in the 900 MHz band in order to ensure that there is enough spectrum in the auction pool.

BSNL employees feel this will make it difficult for the company to operate. “This will leave BSNL without sufficient premium 900 MHZ band spectrum for its own operations and services,” VAN Nambodiri, President of the BSNL Employees Union, wrote in a blog post.

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