These towers will be offered in the second phase of a scheme, launched in July this year, to provide subsidy to companies who want to build towers in various clusters and run mobile services in rural areas.
Naukri.com, which voluntarily started gathering data about caste from registered job seekers from May 2006, said 19 per cent of them were women, 3.4 per cent OBCs, 0.8 per cent SCs and 0.2 per cent STs. There are over 130,000 OBCs, 38,000 SCs and STs, 760,000 women, and 8,000 physically challenged job seekers registered on the job portal.
AT&T has also applied for a universal access service licence (UASL), which allows operators to offer services in both GSM and CDMA technology, with the Mahindra & Mahindra group, for 22 circles. The US company, however, has stipulated that it wants a majority equity stake in the mobile venture.
It was discovered that state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited was given additional spectrum of up to 10 MHz for GSM technology services in over 16 circles even as private competitors have been waiting to be allotted spectrum by the DoT.
Branded Mobi-Retail, this service will be offered to the 35 million subscribers of Reliance Communications, who will be able to use their handsets to buy over 100,000 products ranging from fresh vegetables to groceries, readymade garments, toys etc.
Among the new guidelines under discussion, DoT is looking at raising the net worth criterion of companies applying for a pan-India UASL licence from Rs 1,380 crore to Rs 1,500 crore.
The 40 per cent market share cap suggested by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is likely to make mergers between existing telecom operators extremely tough.
Despite the controversy over the entry of foreign retail giants, the government has cleared foreign direct investment worth only $3.1 million in retail between February 2006 and May 2007.
ADAG's push in film production will be through a new subsidiary of Reliance Entertainment, named Big Motion Pictures Ltd.