To address telecom sector’s woes, the Department of Telecom has notified uniform rules for the rollout of mobile and cable networks across the country that aim to facilitate installation of towers, laying of cables in a time-bound manner and on non-discretionary basis. Expeditious roll out of telecom infrastructure will help improve quality of service, reduce call drops as well as cost of setting up networks.
According to the notification, the authorities involved in granting Right of Way or RoW permit will have to grant permission within 60 days of application. In case of rejection of the application, they should record reasons in writing. If the authority concerned does not reply within 60 days of application submission by telecom operator, the approval for right of way ‘shall be deemed to have been granted’, as per the rules notified by DoT. To check arbitrary fee levied by various agencies on network rollout, authorities have been barred from imposing any fee, charge, lease rental, licence fee other than the expense that they would incur as consequence of the proposed work.