An Overview of Spectrum Management in India for new Telecommunication Services

In early 1990s, the Indian economic policy makers realized that the future economic growth of the country would largely depend on its improved competitiveness in the global market along with rapid growth in exports. It was also visualized in the National Economic Plan 1991 that to achieve the expected growth, one of the major factors would be availability of the contemporary world class telecommunication services in the country. Therefore, development and expansion of the telecommunication services needed higher priority. Accordingly, National Telecom Policy 1994 (NTP94) was drafted. NTP94 had setup national targets for achieving universal access of basic telecom services and also for proliferation of value-added telecom services of international level. In order to meet economic resources required to achieve telecom infra-structure expansion goals, NTP94 proposed migration from monopolistic (incumbent) operator model to private sector participation in telecom services. It was felt that such reforms would introduce competitiveness among operators and increase availability of contemporary telecom services at competitive price to the end user. In view of the constraints on the availability of frequency spectrum for Cellular Mobile Telephone Services (CMTS), a policy of operator selection for the grant of licenses through competitive bidding was also framed in NTP94. Various agencies, like Telecom Regularity Authority of India (TRAI) and Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellant Tribunal (TDSAT), were also formed in late 1990s for recommending new telecom regulations to the Government through open consultation process and for early telecom dispute settlements. Based on the market feedback on the implementation of NTP94, and realizing the need of more effective private participation in developing Indian telecom infrastructure, New Telecom Policy 1999 (NTP99) was framed. Major features of the NTP99 include migration from heavy entry fee for spectrum user operators to annual revenue sharing with the operator. NTP99 also recommended revision of National Frequency Allocation Plan (NFAP) every two years, within ITU-region 3 framework, to account for the requirements of introducing new spectrum efficient technologies and protecting existing users. Wireless Planning Coordination Committee (WPCC) has been responsible for the development of NFAP. Presently, the Indian spectrum is governed by NFAP2002. An interministerial Standing Advisory Committee for Frequency Allocation (SACFA) decides the final site clearance for frequency use by the operator. SACFA has also been reformed over the years. Presently, the licensing period is 20 years, which can be extended up to additional 10 years. Recently, India has adopted unified licensing policy. Extension of spectrum license period incentive, in case of merger/acquisitions of operators, has also been permitted since 2004. With the increase in the subscriber base of an operator in a circle, additional bandwidth can be granted to an operator in small chunks on need by need basis. Such reforms in telecom policies have made the system flexible enough to adopt new technologies easily and respond to market forces with minimum intervention from the Government. This has helped expansion of national telecom networks at reasonable rates and benefit end users to get better telecom services at competitive price.