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Private telecom service providers against TEC's move
By siliconindia
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Monday, 12 November 2007, 20:30 IST
New Delhi: The Telecom Engineering Center's (TEC) new move to revise spectrum allocation raises anguish among private telecom service providers in India. Bharti Airtel chairman and Managing Director Sunil Mittal wrote to the Secretary, Department of Telecom expressing his concern over a proposed revision in the spectrum allocation process. The Vodafone's Arun Sarin and Reliance Communications' Anil Ambani has also written letters to Government.
In separate letters to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and communications and IT minister A Raja, Sarin criticised the recent TEC recommendations, that the subscriber base be increased almost eight times for a Global system for mobile communication (GSM) operator to be eligible for getting extra spectrum.
In an opposite view, Anil Ambani, has written to the Prime Minister, highlighting the "anti-consumer, anti-competition" stance adopted by some GSM players. He has urged on Singh "to see through the motivated agenda of a few existing GSM operators, and not give way to their pressure tactics". Mean while the government on November 6 constituted a committee with experts from the industry and outside to review the TEC's recommendations. The committee is expected to submit a report in three weeks.
Sarin has requested the Prime Minister to "ensure that a thorough and transparent re-evaluation of the technical basis for these decisions (TEC's) is conducted". "Vodafone stands ready to commit its international experts to the process to ensure that all these matters can be thoroughly investigated." he added.
Criticising the TEC's report, Sarin says, "These decisions will make it much more difficult for us to play our part in meeting the government's tele-density targets."
To Raja, Sarin has written, "The TEC's calculations and conclusions on spectral efficiency are inconsistent with our operational experience in serving over 230 million customers in 25 countries across five continents."