Industry body COAI has cautioned that any decision on de-licensing or administrative allocation of high commercial value E and V bands spectrum will violate prevailing policy framework, create non level-playing-field for licenced telcos and cause huge revenue loss to the government.
In a letter to Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, the Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI) on Monday called for allocation of spectrum in these specified bands “through transparent auction to access service providers immediately”.
The COAI emphasised that these bands “are extremely valuable resources for India for 5G as well as backhaul for mobile broadband”.
Radiowaves used for transmitting signals to mobile phones are referred to as the access spectrum while backhaul spectrum augments signals between mobile towers at the back-end.
“...Any decision of de-licensing or administrative allocation of high commercial value spectrum in E and V bands: is technically not feasible, will be contrary to the prevailing policy framework of spectrum allocation, contrary to the principle promulgated by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, contempt of Hon’ble Supreme Court...,” the COAI said.
Such a move would also lead to non-level playing field for licensed telecom operators, will not guarantee the efficient use of these bands, and “cause huge revenue loss to the exchequer”, COAI Director General S P Kochhar said, in the letter seen by PTI.