In a major development, the government on Thursday started allocating spectrum to new telecom players, with Shyam-Sistema becoming the first to receive start up radio frequency for starting CDMA services in various parts of the country.
Shyam-Sistema, a joint venture India's Shyam Telelinks and Russia's Sistema, has been given 2.5 MHz (equivalent of 4.4 MHz of GSM) in the seven states of North-East, Jammu and Kashmir and Assam, official sources told PTI.
Commenting on the development, Rajiv Mehrotra, Chairman of Shyam Group, told PTI: "We are delighted that the government has opened up the way for new telecom players to operate telecom services as soon as possible and this is a major step towards offering cost-effective mobile services."
Russian conglomerate has already announced up to $5 billion (Rs 20,000 crore) investment in the Indian telecom sector. Shyam-Sistema, which currently offers mobile service in Rajasthan, has got licenses for rest of the circles.
Asked about the company's plans to enter GSM arena, company officials said they would be seeking GSM spectrum under the dual technology clause.
But allocation of CDMA spectrum would give advantage to Shyam-Sistema joint venture to start services faster ahead of other new telecom players.
DoT officials said that Communication Minister A Raja has cleared the file for allocating spectrum to Shyam and may start releasing GSM frequency from next week onward.
Apportioning of spectrum among new service providers will pave the way for more competition and cheaper tariffs.
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