The Sanchar Nigam Executive’s Association (SNEA), an association of senior officials of Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) has demanded a probe into the allocation of broadband spectrum to the company, according to news reports. SNEA has said that the allocation is not standardised and is inferior to the one given to private operators, despite having paid the same price.
In a letter to Kapil Sibal, Minister of Telecommunications and IT, SNEA has demanded that BSNL be given the same spectrum as the one allotted to private telecom companies, or its money be refunded.
BSNL paid Rs 83.13 billion in June 2010 for spectrum for 22 telecom circles, almost a year ahead of allocation to private operators. It was asked to match the price of spectrum paid by the highest bidder in each telecom circle.
However, SNEA has said that BSNL’s broadband wireless access (BWA) spectrum, in the 2.6 GHz band, was non-standard for the use of TDD-LTE and services deployed in this band would be too expensive.
SNEA has pointed out that the spectrum allocated to private operators in the 2.3 GHz band can be used for both Wi-Max and LTE services and it gives more area coverage compared to the spectrum allocated to BSNL.
Calling the move discriminatory, the association has requested the minister to re-allocate the spectrum to BSNL.
The association has demanded a probe of the decision taken by BSNL?s management in accepting the BWA spectrum in the uncompetitive frequency band and then giving it to companies for Wi-Max services on a revenue sharing basis, allowing non-existent telecom companies to roam on BSNL?s GSM network.
