After poor response to last month's 2G spectrum sale, a ministerial panel on telecom today decided to lower the base price by 30 per cent for radiowaves in 1800 Mhz band in four circles, which attracted no bidders, for fresh auction this fiscal.These four circles Delhi, Mumbai, Karnataka and Rajasthan were some of the most expensive circles in last month's 2G spectrum auction.

Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters after the meeting that the reserve price for last month's sale per block in Delhi was 693.06 crore Rs, while the same for Mumbai, Karnataka and Rajasthan was fixed at 678.45 crore rupees,330.12 crore Rs and 67.08 crore Rs.The EGoM also decided to auction spectrum in 900 MHz band in Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata simultaneously with sale of radiowaves in 1800 Mhz.

elecom companies whose licences have been cancelled by the Supreme Court will have to pay one time, non-refundable entry fee of Rs one crore for unified licences for each service area. This was stated in the guidelines issued by the Department of Telecommunications in the notice inviting applications for the spectrum auction beginning November 12.

Acoording to guidelines, a non-refundable entry fee of Rs one crore for each Service Area will be paid, except for Jammu and Kashmir and North East Service Areas where Entry Fee shall be Rs 50 lakh each.

The companies whose licences were cancelled after the Supreme Court judgement will be treated as new companies for participating in the auction and they will have to obtain Unified Licence if they win the spectrum.

DoT has said that in addition to the one time non-refundable entry fee, annual licence fee as a percentage of Adjusted Gross Revenue, AGR will be payable as per the rates specified by the Department.

 Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has launched India's first High quality Video Call Office (VCO) in Ahmedabad.

With this launch, the BSNL has become the first Telecom Service Provider in the country to take such an initiative to offer high quality Video calling service to the common man.

After launching the new BSNL initiative, Sam Pitroda, Advisor to The Prime Minister on Public Information Infrastructure and Innovations, said this is an unique initiative which can bridge the gap between Urban and Rural India. He said this will be a platform for growth as this network is ideal for applications like Job interviews, Tele-medicine, Tele-education .

Mr. Pitroda said this service can bring people face to face with many other cities and towns without travel.

 The Telecom Regulator Authority of India, TRAI, has directed telecom companies to de-activate the international calling facility in pre-paid numbers and restore it only after a subscriber gives his or her explicit consent to avail the facility.

The directive follows complaints from consumers about missed calls from international telephone numbers, which are often premium numbers charging high tariff, prompting the consumers to call back. The TRAI has asked the companies to inform all pre-paid subscribers having ISD facility, through SMS, within 10 days of the direction that the facility should be discontinued after sixty days.

It added that if such subscribers want to continue with the facility, they should give their clear and exact consent for availing such facility within 60 days of the receipt of the SMS.

The telecom regulator has also been getting complaints from consumers about receiving calls and SMSes from international numbers informing them about winning prizes or lottery, thus prompting them to call a particular number to claim the prize or lottery money.

It has asked the telecom operators to inform subscribers through SMS, within 10 days of the direction that pre-paid cellular mobile telephone service consumers need not respond to all missed calls from unknown international numbers or calls about winning prizes or lottery.

Nearly 10 months after registering a case, the CBI has asked Department of Telecom (DoT) to provide certified copies of records and files pertaining to licences issued to Bharti and Sterling and Hutchison for increasing spectrum band width. 

Superintendent of Police of CBI has sent a letter to DOT seeking certified copies of licenses, amendments issued by wireless planning and coordination wing of the ministry and subsequent additional spectrum issued to them. CBI sources said documents related to additional spectrum allocation to three companies--beyond 4.4 MHz upto 6.2 MHz, beyond 6.2 MHz up to 8 MHz, and beyond 8MHz up to 10 MHz--should be provided to the agency urgently.

The new Electro magnetic radiation level norms set by the Department of Telecom, DoT, for mobile phone handsets and Mobile Towers comes into effect from tommorow. Addressing the media in New Delhi, Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal said, the handsets sold in the country from tommorow, shall strictly comply with the Specific Absorption Rate, SAR values of 1.6 Watt per Kilogram averaged over 1 gram of human tissue. SAR is an indication of the amount of radiation that is absorbed into a head while using a cellular phone. Imported hansets are also required to comply with the new SAR value norms of the DOT. The Electro magnetic Field (EMF) exposure limit for mobile towers have also been lowered to one tenth of the exisiting guidelines of the International Commission of Non Iodization Radiation Program (ICNIRP). Mr. Sibal said, the old mobile phones and Mobile towers that do not comply to the new radiation norms are to be phased out within one year, that is by September 2013. The Telecom Minister said, a SAR test laboratory is being set up in the Telcom Engineering Centre for testing of mobile handsets both imported and those manufactured in India. He said, radiation measuring equipments are also being procured. Mr. Sibal said, a scientific study on the specific context is being undertaken jointly by the Department of Telcom and Department of Science and Technology in collaboration with ICMR, the Ministry of Environment and Forests and the Ministry of Science and Technology. Mr. Sibal said, Telecom Service providers will have to undertake self certification and audit on compliance of the norms. Verification and random checking will be conducted by the government and any violation of the norms will invite penalisation. The minister also said, 95 per cent of the mobile towers are already compliant to the norms and only the rest will need to be upgraded or replaced. Telecom Secretary R. Chandrasekhar said, the Telecom companies have expressed their willingness to comply to the DOT norms. Mr. Sibal said, the new norms the Department of Telecom is for increased safety from radiation to the mobile phone users and to the public from the radiation emanating from Mobile Towers. Mr. Kapil Sibal said, though specific studies do not indicate the exact impact of the radiation from mobile phones, all measures are being taken to lessen the impact of health hazards to the extent possible.

Retailers and franchisee selling mobile SIM cards will have to register police complaint against subscribers if they submit forged documents to get mobile connections. Under the new guidelines issued by the telecom department, the retailer will have to sign an undertaking that he has verified documents submitted by the customer with original copies of address and identity proof. Telecom Department has also mandated to activate bulk mobile phone connection only after physically verifying details of subscriber and the premise of such subscriber should be re-checked by telecom operator every six month.

he government has disconnected over 51,000 telephone numbers of such subscribers who had not registered as a telemarketer but were doing telemarketing activities. Notices have been served on nearly 88,300 subscribers who have carried out similar violations. 

A press release said that the government is aware that several calls and SMSs are being sent by subscribers, without getting themselves registered with TRAI as a telemarketer, by using normal telephone connections having numbers, other than the '140' number series allotted to registered telemarketers. 

From the complaints' data received from Service Providers, it is seen that the majority of complaints of Unsoliticited Commercial Communications are sent by telecom subscribers who were not registered as a telemarketer.

The Delhi High Court today modified a Company Law Board (CLB) order and allowed Uninor to receive till August 8, the expressions of interest from bidders interested in purchasing the telecom major

Uninor is a joint venture of Norwegian firm Telenor and Unitech Group. 

The Court on August 3 stayed the operation of Uninor's August 1 auction notice for sale of its assets, saying the proposed auction process appeared to be very clever one.

The Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) on telecom headed by Home Minister P Chidambaram on Friday decided to recommend to the Cabinet a price lower reserve price for spectrum auction than the sector regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) proposed earlier.

The reconstituted EGoM, which met for the second time this week in New Delhi, firmed up its views on key issues like reserve price, spectrum usage charge and terms of payment. The same are being sent to the Union Cabinet, headed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, for a decision, Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal said after a two-and- a-half-hours meeting.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India had recommended a base price of Rs 3,622 crore per unit of spectrum---called MegaHertz---for the auction of spectrum vacated from the Supreme Court canceling 122 licences issued by the then Telecom Minister A Raja in 2008.

This base price translated to over Rs 18,000 crore for a pan-India spectrum for new companies.

The department of telecom, DoT, has released an initial set of guidelines for the upcoming auction and allotment of spectrum in 1800 megahertz, MHZ, and 800 MHZ bands. In a notification issued on its website on Tuesday, the DoT said it will auction eight blocks of bandwidth in the 1800 megahertz, MHZ, band. Each block will be of 1.25 megahertz and the validity of the spectrum auctioned will be 20 years. In the 800 MHz band, three blocks each of 1.25 MHz will be put on auction. It added the auction will be open to all, including companies affected by the Supreme Court ruling canceling their telecom licenses.
The telecom department said it will announce other details later, such as the starting auction price, the terms of payment, annual spectrum usage charges as well as deadlines for rollout of services.

The number of subscribers opting for mobile number portability, MNP, has risen substantially. An official statement by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India says, till the end of April this year, about 45.89 million subscribers have submitted their requests to different service providers for porting their numbers. Karnataka has received the maximum number of 5.11 million requests. It is followed by Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat where 4.44 million and 4.23 million subscribers opted for the service.

AIR Correspondent reports, a customer has to pay 19 rupees to the new operator for porting the number and remain with it for at least three months under the MNP. The customer has to send an SMS from the existing phone to 1900. A unique porting code is sent by the existing provider. An application then has to be filed with the new service provider mentioning the code for transferring the connection. The country has over 920 million mobile phone subscribers.

he court, while granting him bail on May 15, had imposed certain conditions, including that he would not visit his home state without its prior permission. Raja had moved the plea seeking permission to visit Tamil Nadu.

Raja had sought court's permission also on the ground that the trial proceedings would not be undertaken from June 9 to June 30 owing to summer vacation.

The Indian Air Force has signed an agreement with BSNL and MTNL under which the two players would provide Air force a host of services at concessional rates. In a statement issued in New Delhi today, the BSNL said the objective is to enable BSNL and MTNL to provide IAF full gamut of telecom services, including basic telephony, mobile telephony, broadband and internet services and leased lines. 

With the agreement coming into effect, the two public sector units will get the status of most Preferred Service Provider by Indian Air Force . 

The joint agreement with IAF is also a step towards synchronising their businesses as the Department of Telecommunications is examining the feasibility of merging telecom PSUs ITI and MTNL with BSNL in line.

The Government has instructed all cell phone manufacturers to include radiation tags in mobile handsets to display Specific Absorption Rate, SAR, value by the first of September this year. A radiation tag is a device embedded within a cell phone for checking radiation emitting from it.

The minister of State for Communication and Information Technology Milind Deora gave this information in Rajya Sabha today. Mr Deora said that all the indigenous manufactures have been instructed to make necessary changes in the design, software and packaging in compliance with these instructions within the stipulated time. 

He said that to regulate indigenous as well as imported mobile phones, the Bureau of Indian Standards, BIS have been asked to frame standards under the BIS Act 1986.

Talking to AIR, Cyber and Telecom Expert Pawan Duggal said that it is a good step as it will protect consumers from harmful effects of radiation and create awareness about its dangers. He said it will help users to know how much radiation is emitting from a particular cell phone.

Concerned over poor telephone connectivity in remote Naxal-affected areas, the government is planning to install 2,200 mobile towers in nine Maoist-hit states by the end of this year. 

Following a request by the Home Ministry, the Department of Telecommunication has roped in the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited to carry out the ambitious project to strengthen the mobile telephone network by setting up the towers in remote inaccessible areas where Maoists have a strong presence. 

Official sources said, the towers will be set up in consultations with the state governments near establishments of security forces, police stations or other secured locations as the Naxals have often been targeting such towers in the past. 

The proposal will be submitted before the Union Cabinet soon and once it gets approval, work will start immediately.

They said, the states that will benefit from the project include Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Bihar, West Bengal and Maharashtra.

The Supreme Court today set up a joint expert panel to recommend the procedure for the telecom firms for properly identifying the customers before issuing SIM cards to them. 

A bench of Chief Justice S H Kapadia said the panel comprising officials of the Department of Telecommunications and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India will submit its report to the government within three months.

The bench passed the order on a plea by a petitioner seeking its direction to the government to frame guidelines for telecom firms for issuing SIM cards.

Revenue of Afghanistan's fast-growing telecom sector had crossed 190 million dollar last year,30 million dollars more than in the year before. In an interview with a local news agency Afghan Telecommunication and Information Technology Minister Amirzai Sangin said the telecom sectors' rapid growth across the country had contributed to soaring revenues. He attributed the growth to robust communication services industry and installation of fiber-optic network crises-crossing the country.  Currently, most provinces of Afghanistan are connected by the high-speed telecommunication cable network. The ambitious plan to lay fiber-optic cable country-wide kicked-off in 2007, spanning 3,300 kilometers, connecting Kabul with four provinces of the country. Although security risks hampered installation works in some parts of the country, but 80 percent work of the project was completed in two years. Telecom and Information Technology Minister said with the completion of the mega technology project, subscribers would enjoy cheaper rates for telephone calls, internet, television and radio services, with improved speed and quality as well. AIR correspondent reports, telecommunications is one of the sectors in which Afghanistan has made rapid progress during the last decade. Telecom services in Afghanistan are currently available in almost 85 per cent of the country and there are 18 million subscribers nationwide. Afghan government has planed to provide telecom services across the nation in the next two years. Internet connectivity in Afghanistan is also increasing phenomenally. Nearly eight percent telecom consumers are using internet services, and with the introduction of the 3G and WIMAX services, the figure is likely to swell to 50 percent very soon. Afghan government is also planning to install its own telecommunication satellite, which will further improve telecom services in the country.

Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal today launched the country's first ever fourth generation mobile services in Kolkata. Today's launch is a major milestone for India and Bharti Airtel as it will result in India becoming one of the first countries in the world to commercially deploy the cutting-edge technology.

Compared to the existing 3G services that allow downloads speed of up to 21 mbps, 4G allows download speed of upto 100 mbps, which is almost 5 times higher than 3G.