India - spectrum

GSM lobby moves tribunal against expert report

Not satisfied with the government’s move to review the expert committee recommendation on spectrum allocation, GSM operators’ body COAI today moved telecom tribunal TDSAT challenging the criteria adopted by the Department of Telecom (DoT).

Members of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone-Essar and Idea Cellular, met here and decided to go ahead with filing of the affidavit in the TDSAT against the Telecom Engineering Centre’s (TEC’s) report.

The COAI has also questioned the government’s move to allocate spectrum to two telecom PSUs — BSNL and MTNL — saying they have been given frequency out of turn as many other players have been waiting to get spectrum for months and even years now.

Today’s affidavit would widen the scope of COAI’s original petition challenging the DoT’s decision to allow use of dual technology thereby permitting operators to offer mobile services using both technologies (GSM and CDMA) simultaneously within a circle.

In the face of stiff opposition from the GSM lobby, the government yesterday announced to form a panel to look into the TEC report on spectrum allocation.

Earlier Raja had informed the prime minister that the TEC, a technical wing of the DoT, had recommended very scientific criteria for spectrum allocation and the same had been accepted in-principle by his ministry.

According to the TEC report, none of the existing GSM players would remain eligible to get additional spectrum as the body had recommended 4-15 times higher subscriber limit for additional spectrum.