(7 July 2010 8:50 pm)

NEW DELHI: The Government today decided to refer the concerns of telecom operators on recent recommendations of Trai to an Internal Committee of the Department of Telecommunications headed by Member (Technology).

This decision was taken here today in a meeting of the Minister of Communications and Information Technology Minister A Raja with the representatives of Access Service Providers viz. COAI and AUSPI and representatives of their member service providers. CMDs of MTNL and BSNL were also present.

Various issues on licences, spectrum, allocation, charging of spectrum and roll-out obligations, merger and acquisitions and other related issues were discussed in the meeting and it has been decided that the Internal Committee will finalize the views and refer to Telecom Commission.

The Telecom Commission also decided to constitute an Internal Committee under Chairmanship of Member (Services), Department of Telecom, to give its recommendations on implementation of the Sam Pitroda Committee Report for improving performance of BSNL.

The Committee will take inputs from BSNL including its Employees Association and submit its report to Full Telecom Commission within a month.

The decision was taken in the meeting of Full Telecom Commission held under the Chairmanship of Telecom Secretary and Telecom Commission Chairman P J Thomas.

The Commission has also decided to constitute an Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) under Chairmanship of Member (Telecom) in the Department of Telecom with representatives from all stakeholders as members to examine the issue of imposition of financial penalty for violation of terms and conditions of UAS/CMTS license agreements.