Govt expects to raise Rs 31,589 cr as one-time spectrum fee

The government expects to raise a whopping Rs 31,589 crore from telecom firms, which includes more than Rs 2,700 crore from operators whose licences were cancelled by the Supreme Court, as one-time spectrum fee.

However, so far only Tata Teleservices (TTSL) has paid a part of the one-time spectrum charge, that too under protest, Minister of State for Communications and IT Milind Deora said in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha.

"Demands on account of one-time spectrum changes and spectrum usage charges have been issued to telecom service providers. TTSL has paid one-time spectrum charges for Rs 62.19 crore under protest," Deora told the Upper House.

He added that TTSL has made the payment against the demand of one-time spectrum charge of Rs 1,152.68 crore.

Apart from one-time spectrum charge, telecom operators owe Rs 2,566.11 crore to the government as spectrum usage charges for which they have sent representations, Deora said.

"Representations against spectrum usage charges have been received from all telecom service providers, which are being examined," he added.

BSNL owes a maximum one-time fee of Rs 6,927.05 crore, followed by Bharti Airtel (Rs 5,201.24 crore), Vodafone (Rs 3,599.40 crore), MTNL (Rs 3,313.15 crore), Reliance Communications (Rs 1,931.36 crore), Idea Cellular (Rs 1,882 crore) and Aircel (Rs 1,351.51 crore) among others, he said.

Of the cancelled licences, Etisalat DB owes government Rs 605.02 crore, followed by Unitech (Rs 513.40 crore), Videocon (Rs 501.11 crore) and Loop Telecom (Rs 389.48 crore).

Besides, the cancelled licensees also owe Rs 47.94 crore as spectrum usage charges, the minister told the House.

Earlier, telecom operators were given 4.4 Mhz of spectrum with licence at price of Rs 1,658 crore for pan-India operations and later they were entitled to get 1.8 Mhz spectrum on fulfilment of certain subscriber base criteria.

In November, the government had decided to levy one-time fee on GSM-based telecom operators for airwaves they hold beyond 4.4 Mhz at an auction-determined price, while CDMA carriers pay for holdings beyond 2.5 MHz for the remaining validity of their permits.