July 17, 2013 / 08:46 IST
The department of telecom (DoT) may be moving towards 100% foreign direct investment (FDI) in telecom services, sources told CNBC-TV18. A meeting between the Prime Minister, telecom minister and 10 other ministers will be held to consider the FDI proposals, reports CNBC-TV18’s Siddharth Zarabi.
The meeting will also decide on the possibility of allowing spectrum trading. Under this proposal, a company with spectrum should be allowed to lease it out or rent it out to other companies. The DoT will also move towards issuing merger and acquisition guidelines by September 15 or perhaps even much earlier, sources told CNBC-TV18. Also read: DoT sends unified licensing norms for law ministry nodThe cabinet note by the DoT will seek permission for doing small administrative allocations of spectrum. For instance, if one needs a gap spectrum of around half a megahertz, an auction may not be possible. This means the proposal is seeking exception to the rule wherein allotment of spectrum without an auction is barred. However, this is subject to formal cabinet process.In addition, the government will seek fresh TRAI recommendations for fixing base price of spectrum. The TRAI is likely to give details and recommendations within the next six to eight weeks from now. This was an embargoed piece of news which was aired by CNBC-TV18 only after a wire agency broke it.
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