The defence ministry has charged the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) over its failure to inform prospective bidders that the former had vacated two blocks of 3G spectrum for the upcoming auctions.
Telecom minister A Raja is likely to face wrath from different stakeholders with the recent defence ministry’s announcement. On October 26 this year, A Raja wrote to the finance ministry to ask the defence ministry to vacate 3G airwaves ahead of the auctions scheduled for early January 2010.
In its reply, the defence ministry has said that enough airwaves were vacated by October 22 to facilitate two players, the DoT had failed to share this information with the country’s telecom operators.
The revelations by the defence ministry have significant bearings on the contours of the 3G auctions scheduled for January next year as spectrum scarcity poised a major hurdle to the auction process. Accordingly, the telecom operators will now have to re-think their strategies.