One can always trust the Department of Telecom to come up with the most radical of ideas and storm up controversies. Of course, it must be said that almost all the ideas, DoT has ever implemented, have benefited the end user till sun dawn.  And of course, they have done it again, their favorite theft of time, the 3G policy.

Amidst all the recent hype about the 3G spectrum allocation and auctioning off the same, the Department of Telecom has expressed its interest to charge the 3G spectrum owners additionally for using cellular services on the spectrum above 6.2 MHz (allocated for 2G).

There have been a lot of speculations making the rounds of the rumor grapevine that the operators might have to pay anywhere between Rs 40 crores to Rs 266 crores per unit of spectrum, 6.2 MHz onwards. Although the DoT maintains that no decision has yet been taken and more confirmed news can be gathered by October, if such a plan gets passed, telecom operators like Bharti Airtel might end up paying to the degree of Rs 10,000 crores extra (since Bharti Airtel has already been allocated almost 12MHz, based on subscriber numbers)

DoT just might be sympathetic towards operators since it’s a herculean task to pay up such huge amounts at once and might even topple India from the crown of providing the cheapest call rates in the world. A better idea would be to charge for the additional spectrums as a percentage of the operators’ annual revenue, loosening the noose around their necks a little.

What really baffles me is how could every operator be charged extra for the extra spectrum, out of the blue? If Bharti Airtel has already been allocated 12MHz, I’m sure they had duly paid for the same. Doesn’t this mean you got to pay for your already bought goods once again? Moreover, if players like Airtel do not end up winning a 3G spectrum (although such a scenario looks extremely unlikely), will they still have to pay up for the extra spectrum? How much shall this affect the current call rates and data plans already applicable in the market? Any guesses?

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