Industry rings alarm bells on Trai norms

DoT finds suggestions on spectrum 'reasonable'.

A day after the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) issued its recommendations on spectrum usage, GSM mobile service providers and technical experts are divided on the impact these recommendations will have on the quality of services.

GSM operators, who account for 75 per cent mobile telephony services in India, said consumers should be ready for more congestion on mobile networks and more drop calls if the department of telecom accepted the suggestions.

But technical experts and analysts say the fears are unfounded as telecom service providers can invest in a range of technologies for using spectrum more efficiently.

The Trai has suggested a near-doubling of the number of subscribers the operators need to show to get more spectrum for large cities and circles. This has been increased four-fold for smaller circles.

The DoT today favoured the recommendations, terming them prima facie "reasonable". It has set up a committee to frame new criteria for spectrum allocation.

The committee, which had members from the Telecom Engineering Centre, the Telecom Commission and the Indian Institute of Technology, would meet soon, said official sources. It would also invite members of both associations of telecom players, they said.

However, the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), which represents operators using Global Systems for Mobile Communication (GSM) technology, is opposed to the Trai's proposals.

"We are facing spectrum crunch and congestion in most large cities. Under the new proposed rules, no operator will be entitled to additional spectrum within the current subscriber bases," said TV Ramachandran, director-general, COAI.

For instance, Bharti and Vodafone, which have 10 MHz spectrum in Delhi, will have to show three million subscribers to get more spectrum.

A CEO of a leading GSM telecom company said the threshold had been raised so that the operators did not get more spectrum in areas where they needed it desperately.

"In Delhi, the leading operator has a subscriber base of 2.6 million and only 10 MHz spectrum. It will now have to double the subscriber base before it is entitled to another 5 MHZ," he said.

Industry experts, however, point out that there is a substantial scope for using spectrum more efficiently. They say China's spectral efficiency is two-and-a-half-times India's.

Many companies are already using spectrum-maximising technologies like specialised towers that increase the capacity by over 150 per cent, adaptive handsets that lead to a 70 per cent increase in network capacity, specialised software to reduce interference, and specialised FEMTO cells that transfer intra-office calls through a local area network, releasing spectrum for outdoor uses.