India pledges to make telecoms policy more transparent

Jan 29, 2011, 10:45 GMT

New Delhi - India said Saturday it would unveil a new telecommunications policy to make the scandal-tainted sector more transparent and allow fairer competition among operators.

Federal investigators are probing the sale of 2G spectrum and licences in 2008 which a government auditor says were steeped in irregularities and could have cost the exchequer more than 39 billion dollars.

The scandal led to the resignation of Andimuthu Raja as telecommunications minister in November.

'We've reached a stage where the objectives of the existing policy has been well served. Every circle has 12 to 14 competitors. Tele-density has reached almost 62 per cent. Now the broad contours of the policy needs a directional shift,' Raja's successor Kapil Sibal said Saturday.

Under the new policy, revenue sharing between the government and telecoms firms would be uniform and no free start-up spectrum would be provided as before, the minister said.

Spectrum would also be auctioned rather than tied to licences.

An auction of third generation or 3G spectrum in in May 2010 fetched 15 billion dollars for the government.

'It also is necessary to ensure a level playing field for all players. Going forward, any new policy on pricing would need to be applied equally to all players,' Sibal added.

India is among the fastest growing telecommunications markets in the world with a subscriber base of more than 706 million people and growing by at least 17 million news subscribers every month.

The scandal over the 2G license allocation brought Parliament into deadlock through the winter session with opposition lawmakers demanding a cross-party investigation into the affair.

India's Supreme Court is also hearing a case related to the alleged scam.

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