No headway in telecom commission meeting

The telecom commission, the highest decision making body of the department of telecommunications (DoT), on Tuesday met to discuss various issues, including one-time charge on operators for holding excess spectrum and the sale of surplus VSNL land. But the meeting remained inconclusive.

It agreed in principle to the DoT’s internal panel’s view that the surplus VSNL land should be sold. But it had sought clarifications on the land deeds from DoT before going ahead with the sale, sources said.

The internal panel had recommended surplus VSNL land be sold or transferred to a separate company to be managed by DoT. The telecom commission members have sought details on the funding mechanism and viability of the proposed company by DoT.

VSNL was taken over by Tata Communications in 2002, but the deal did not include 773.13 acres of the company’s land asset. This land asset has been lying unused since then.

Some members also asked DoT to seek legal opinion on issues like one-time charge on operators for spectrum beyond contracted limit, before which a final decision cannot be taken, a senior ministry official said.

The commission has members from the finance and information technology ministries, Planning Commission, and the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion. It will again meet at the end of this month.

After deliberations by the commission, the main policy changes will be referred to the Cabinet for a final decision.

Major proposed policy changes like revising the structure of unified access service license, delinking of spectrum from licence and pricing of excess spectrum will be taken to the Cabinet, as these decisions were earlier taken by it under the aegis of the National Telecom Policy 99 (NTP 99).

Any change in the letter and spirit of NTP 99 on the licence and spectrum issues had to be subjected to the scrutiny of the Cabinet and Parliament, the department had said.