The Department of Telecommunications is looking at allowing two or three more pan-India telecom operators on stricter entry criteria as part of the new guidelines for allocation of Universal Access Service License.

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.

These and other guidelines are being considered by a DoT internal committee that is expected to finalise the new criteria for UASL applications in 10 days. Yesterday, Communications Minister A Raja announced a deadline of October 1 for new UASL applicants.

To ensure that only serious players are in contention, DoT is also looking at reducing the time allowed for operators to convert their letters of intent to licences to less than a week against the current 90-day period.

In simple terms, this means that applicants that are cleared for UASL will now have to pay the licence fee within a week of the award.

To this end, DoT is also planning to give preference in spectrum allocation to companies that apply for a pan-Indian licence over those that plan to operate only in some of the country's 22 telecom circles.

It is also considering offering spectrum on a "first-come, first-served basis" to the company that pays its licence fee the earliest.

India currently has five pan-India mobile service providers. Some 140 applications are pending for UASLs, which allow service providers to offer both CDMA and GSM mobile technologies.