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The
Department of Telecom had recommended that in the event of
any auction of spectrum pending finalisation of the Unified
Licensing Regime, UAS licence without spectrum may be issued
which could be subject to a requirement to migrate to Unified
licence as and when the regime is put in place. Detailed guidelines
for such UAS licence without spectrum would be finalised after
receipt of recommendations of TRAI in this regard.
There
will be uniform licence fee across all telecom licenses and
service areas which will progressively be made equal to 8
per cent of the Adjusted Gross Revenue (AGR) in two yearly
steps starting from 2012-13.
The
licence fee and spectrum usage charges payable by each such
licensee shall be on actual AGR, subject to a minimum presumptive
AGR. This minimum figure would be reviewed by Trai every year.
A
decision on the recommendation to bring IP-I Service Providers
under licencing regime who are currently unlicenced passive
infrastructure providers has been deferred for further examination.
A
rapid comprehensive techno-economic study will be carried
out by DoT to examine issues relating to increase in coverage
and tele-density in rural areas while at the same time ensuring
sustained quality of service and also to examine the adequacy
of USOF mechanism alone to achieve these objectives and the
need for augmenting USOF schemes with appropriate direct incentivisation
of TSPs for rural rollout.
The
validity of existing UAS (& CMTS and Basic services) licences
may be extended for another 10 years at one time, as per the
provisions of the extant licensing regime with suitable Terms
& Conditions so as not to imply automatic continuance
of existing license and related conditions including quantum
and price of any spectrum allocated.
On
extension, the UAS licensee will be required to pay a fee
which will be Rs 20 million for Metro and ‘A’ Circles,
Rs 10 million for ‘B’ circles and Rs 5 million for
‘C’ circles. This fee does not cover the value of
spectrum, which shall be paid for separately. While extending
the licence, the licensee shall be assigned spectrum only
up to the prescribed limit or the amount of spectrum assigned
to it before the extension, whichever is less. Spectrum assigned
by the Government to the licensee in excess of the prescribed
limit shall be withdrawn.
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