The Union Budget 2007-08 has received a subdued response from the telecom industry. According to the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), though the budget includes some small, positive initiatives for the sector, there is nothing of significance. The government could have changed some of the levies and charges. For instance, the industry wanted the licence fees to be reduced from 10 per cent to 6 per cent. Moreover, mobile content service providers have been brought under the service tax net. For now though, value-added service providers have stated that they will not hike tariffs for mobile content such as ringtones and downloads. On the long-standing industry demand for a unified tax structure for the sector, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram has asked the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to commission a study to create a single tax structure.
