Department of Telecom speeds up spectrum allocation

The Department of Telecom (DoT) has issued the Letter of Intent (LoI) to all the telecom players that participated in the March auction and is speeding up spectrum allocation to them.

"As of now, we are expediting to allocate the spectrum which has already been auctioned this year... The Letter of Intent has been issued to all," Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told PTI.

The government got around Rs 1.1 lakh crore from the sale of air waves in four bands -- 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz and 2100 MHz -- in March. The government put around 470 MHz of spectrum for sale in the four bands and about 11% of the air waves remained unsold.

According to a DoT official, some spectrum has already been allocated to operators while the process is on for the remainder. The Letter of Intent mentions the effective date for the spectrum.

Eight telecom operators participated in the auction, which saw all of them winning air waves except Uninor.

The government had received a total upfront payment of over Rs 32,300 crore from telecom players against the spectrum sold, well above the minimum outstanding due of Rs 28,835.34 crore.