Trai has forwarded the Draft Request For Proposal (RFP) to the department of telecom for the selection of an operator which would be licenced for providing and operating mobile number portability solutions in the country.

"The Mobile Number Portability Clearing House Administrator (MCHA) should be licenced through a competitive bidding process," Trai said in a statement.

MNP is expected to lead to shifting of subscribers from one operator to other in large scale. The move is opposed by the existing GSM operators who had demanded that the number portability should be implemented across the services  mobile and fixed line both.

The Telecom regulator has also recommended a cap of less than 10 per cent on the equity holding of telecom service providers in the proposed third party operator, similarly the operator should not be allowed to hold 10 per cent or more stake in the any of the telecom companies.

Earlier, Trai had constituted a panel consisting of representatives from DoT, TEC, all service providers and associations for deliberating on the methodology for selecting a neutral third party or parties who could act as MCHA.

Based on the interim report of the panel the regulator has now come out with draft guidelines for the appointment of a central agency.