Upset over the policy framework for issuing new licences and allocating spectrum, GSM player Vodafone on Friday asked the government to formulate 'long-term' policies for sustainability and favoured auctioning of the radio frequency.

"We always prefer long-term regulatory policies as we have to plan our businesses for long-term," Arun Sarin, the outgoing CEO of UK-based Vodafone Group, said.

Asked whether his company did see any change in the last 18 months since it acquired the controlling stake in Hutchison, Sarin said 'clearly certain things have changed. . . I always looked for long-term policy'.

"But as far as Vodafone's operations are concerned, India has been a very exciting market. When we started about 18 months ago we just had 20 million subscribers and today we have 50 million and we are looking to achieve the 100 million mark very soon," he said.

On the contentious issue of approach towards spectrum allocation to new players and also to CDMA operators under dual technology, Sarin said, "Auction is always a good way. . . whatever the way highest valuation national government can get is always good."

He also looked excited about the forthcoming 3G mobile services and said his company would bring in lots of products relating to wireless broadband and Internet. 

Asked whether further consolidation was possible in India, Sarin said it has been happening the world over and this would be the phenomenon here too.

"Telecom is a business of scale so consolidation will happen," he said.

He, however, did not elaborate on whether Vodafone was looking at opportunities in India to go for more acquisitions.

Vittorio Calao, who will be succeeding Sarin, said he was excited about the business opportunities in India and praised Sarin for making Vodafone truly a world class telecom company.