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The Committee of the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), which is studying the recommendations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on spectrum pricing, is likely to submit its report within the next two days, said an official of DoT who is a member of the Committee.
“We are working on the same. Nothing has been finalised yet. It would be completed soon and would be submitted with the next two days,” said the official. The report would be given to Telecom Commission. The nine-member Committee of DoT is headed by Member (Technology) of DoT, Anil Kaushal.
Meanwhile, industry insiders have said that the DoT Committee is likely to ask TRAI to give more details. Broadly, the DoT Committee is likely to ask TRAI to give suggestions on pricing of spectrum for the 900MHz band for all the 22 telecom zones in India, rather than just three circles for which the regulator has already given its recommendations, said the industry sources, adding that it may also ask for suggestions on pricing of 800MHz spectrum band for all the circles that it would put for auction. As TRAI has given its recommendations on spectrum usage charges (SUC) voluntarily, the DoT Committee may ask for details on possible impact on revenue of the Government for the suggested changes on SUC, said the industry sources. The DoT Committee is likely to accept full refarming of 900MHz spectrum.
TRAI had recommended a reduction in the base price of 1800MHz by 37% to Rs 1,496 crore, and upto 60% in 900MHz in the circles of Delhi (ar Rs 288 crore), Mumbai (at Rs 262 crore) and Kolkata (at Rs 100 crore) which will come for auction next year. However, it has said that CDMA operators have enough spectrum in the 800MHz band and the extended GSM band should be also offered for auction with 900MHz.
Telecom operators have, however, expressed concern on a few recommendations of TRAI.
The regulator has also rejected the demand of the GSM operators for reserving at least 5MHz in the 900 Mhz band for incumbent operators, and has recommended that all the spectrum should come for auction.
The Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India (Auspi), which bats for the CDMA operators in India, has said that if the Government decides to take spectrum out from the 800MHz band for the proposed extended GSM band it would kill the growth of CDMA operators.
The GSM operator have demanded a further reduction in the base price which has been pegged at 80% of the valuation price, and have said that without reservation of spectrum in the 900MHz band they will have to make huge investments to shift their subscribers to 1800 Mhz band in case they do not get the requisite spectrum in auction.
The regulators decision to have a uniform 3% spectrum usage charge instead of a myriad of rates has been opposed by Reliance Jio Infocomm which has said that this would be unfair on the 4G operators as its SUC charges will go up from the current 1%.
TRAI has recommended the three% spectrum usage chares for the BWA spectrum holders considering the recent decision of the Government to allow BWA spectrum holders to offer voice services using the spectrum they currently hold. On the other hand, the existing voice service operators pay eight% as spectrum usage charge.
