Govt issues guidelines to liberalise 2G spectrum
New Delhi: The Department of Telecom today issued guidelines to liberalise the 2G spectrum whereby operators will be able to offer latest mobile services, including 4G, using the same radiowaves.
The logjam between the government and incumbent operators on the issue, which has been under litigation, is now expected to seem some movement. “Existing CMTS/UAS/Ul with access service authorisation licensees may liberalise their entire administratively alloted spectrum holding in 800 Mhz and 1800 Mhz band in a service area for the balance validity period of right to use spectrum,” the guidelines said. The development is likely to benefit almost all incumbent telecom operators like Reliance Communications, Aircel, Tata Teleservices, Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular. They hold spectrum that was allocated to them administratively along with their first licence at a price of `1,658 crore.
Govt, RBI on same page on monetary policy committee structure
New Delhi: RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan on Thursday said the Government and the central bank have agreed on composition of the interest rate-setting monetary policy committee (MPC).”MPC agreement has been largely done. Only fine-tuning is left. The Government and RBI are broadly on the same page on composition of MPC,” Rajan told reporters here.The Government has proposed to set up MPC, which will consist of representatives from the Finance Ministry and RBI, to decide on interest rate.
Govt approves amendment to tax treaty with Turkmenistan
New Delhi: The Government on Thursday approved amending the Double Taxation Avoidance Convention (DTAC) signed with Turkmenistan. India signed the treaty with Turkmenistan in 1997. The Cabinet approved the amendment to DTAC for the avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income and on capital, through a Protocol, an official
release said. The protocol provides for internationally accepted standards for effective exchange of information on tax matters including bank information and information without domestic tax interest, it said.The information received from Turkmenistan in respect of a resident of India can be shared with other law enforcement agencies with authorisation of the Competent Authority of Turkmenistan and vice versa, it added.