Telecom Commission Likely to Meet in Mid-October

New Delhi: The Telecom Commission is likely to discuss in the middle of next month key pending issues like spectrum auction, full mobile number portability (MNP) and spectrum sharing and trading rules.

"We are looking for dates around of mid of October," a Department of Telecom official told PTI.

The last meeting of the inter-ministerial panel was held on June 13.

The working group at DoT on spectrum auction is likely to conclude its study around first week of October after which it will be placed before the Telecom Commission which comprises members from DoT, Department of Electronics and IT, Planning Commission, Finance Ministry and Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP).

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has already given its final view on issues that were raised with respect to full MNP - a service which will allow mobile subscribers to change their operator in any part of the country while retaining their number. At present, a subscriber can avail such facility within same telecom service circle.

The telecom regulator has also given its recommendation with respect to auction of CDMA spectrum (800 Mhz band) and is working on recommendation for radio waves in 900 Mhz and 1800 Mhz bands which at present are used for GSM services by telecom operators like Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular, Videocon etc.

TRAI has also given its recommendation for spectrum sharing and trading. These two proposals are aimed at facilitating telecom operators to get spectrum through a business deal from other telecom operator without having to wait for allocation from the government.

After Supreme Court verdict that cancelled 122 2G licences, government has been allocating spectrum through auction only.

The inter-ministerial panel will also review status of national optical fibre network which aims to connect 2.5 lakh village panchayats with high speed broadband by March 2017.