The government is reportedly planning to abolish the cross-holding rules in telecom which stipulate that no licensee or its promoters can directly or indirectly have any stake in another company that holds spectrum in the same service area.
If approved, the new guidelines for providing a unified licence to service providers, would allow a promoter to be the legal entity other than the government, financial and scheduled banks that hold more than 10 per cent equity in the licensee company. The regulations also specify that holding equity directly or indirectly in the licensee company would amount to ?beneficial interest, which will not be allowed. Companies having arrangements contrary to these guidelines will be given a year to comply with the new guidelines.
