Tribunal rejects Tata plea for taking back excess airwaves from GSM cos

NEW DELHI: The telecoms tribunal has dismissed a petition by Tata Teleservices seeking that incumbent GSM operators be asked to give back all airwaves they hold beyond the 6.2 MHz mark in any circle.

The tribunal's dismissal of the petition is a significant setback for companies such as Tata Tele and Reliance Communications, which have always maintained that mobile permits entitles a cellphone operator to a maximum of 6.2 MHz or units of GSM airwaves. India is divided into 22 telecom circles.

Tatas and RCOM claim that incumbents were given additional airwaves beyond the contracted limit without payment of any market-linked fee, thereby resulting in huge losses to the government.

On the other hand incumbents — Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Essar, BSNL and Idea Cellular — say that existing policy gives them a maximum of 15 MHz of airwaves per circle, while the limit for CDMA players is 7.5 MHz.

Incumbents also claim that all allotments beyond 6.2 MHz are in line with government policies and add that the legality of it had been upheld by the telecom ministry in Parliament and on affidavit in the telecoms tribunal, where it has been categorically and repeatedly averred that the initial and additional spectrum have been allotted as per provisions of licence agreement and as per guidelines notified from time to time.

Tata Tele had also sought that both GSM and CDMA based telcos be awarded equal amounts of spectrum, another demand that has been dismissed by the tribunal.

The tribunal while dismissing the petition said it had not been shown that the policy decision adopted was either unconstitutional or contrary to the national policy.

The tribunal said that it had also not been shown that 'said policy decision has been adopted without taking into consideration all relevant factors', and added the 'petitioner had failed to produce any material to show that the policy decision adopted by the government was arbitrary or purely discriminatory in nature'.