The big beneficiaries of this move will be the big three -- Bharti, Vodafone and Idea.
Auctions for spectrum for 3G or third-generation telecom services could be delayed from an already rescheduled date of January 30 after the Department of Telecommunications sought legal opinion on whether it should send the finance ministry's suggestion on doubling the reserve price back to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India for its endorsement.
"There is no plan to disinvest in BSNL," Telecom Secretary J S Sarma told reporters
In the midst of the battle between the Tatas and Birlas over stake-holding in their telecom joint venture Idea
The government has held back allocating additional spectrum to Bharti Airtel in Orissa, in view of the telecom tribunal's recent judgment that GSM operators have no vested right to get airwaves beyond 6.2 MHz.
SC raised questions over the government's decision ordering mandatory seeding of mobile numbers with Aadhaar.
The government on Tuesday has directed telecom service providers, including Reliance Infocomm and Tatas, to submit compliance report on fixed wireless services, ensuring that they confine to the user premises, by March 31.
The Department of Telecom may bar operators holding 3G airwaves from sharing the high-speed spectrum.
Of late, net neutrality has generated much debate.
The department of telecommunications (DoT) has pulled up mobile service providers for offering the National Anthem as a ringback tone.In a notice to all telecom service providers, the department said this was a breach of the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971, and executive instructions relating to the anthem.
The Natio0nal Investigation Agency has approached the Department of Telcom requesting for installation of Central Monitoring System, a mechanism which provides for interception of telephone calls and monitoring of social networking sites without any involvement of telecom service providers.
Further telecom tariff reduction is on the anvil as department of telecom is in the process of issuing direction to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India to come out with the revenue-share based access deficit charge.
Also said if some govt bodies have already been allowed to enter business, the Central Govt should provide appropriate exit route.
"As the existing licensees have already made huge investments in the infrastructure and their systems are in place, therefore, they will be in a better position to deliver 3G services efficiently at low incremental cost," Trai said in its views on permitting new entity for 3G Services.
Prasad also said India will be a $1 trillion opportunity for digital companies in five years
The Aadhaar-enabled payment system, or AEPS, allows consumers who don't have smartphones or debit cards to perform basic banking transactions like cash deposit, cash withdrawal, intrabank or interbank fund transfer, balance enquiry and obtaining a mini statement through biometric authentication at micro-ATMs.
Leading telecom operators including Bharti Airtel, BSNL, Vodafone and the Tatas are understood to have been slapped penalty for non-verification of subscribers in the J&K and Assam circles.
I-T heat on thousands of firms for unusual cash deposits.
The auction will continue on Tuesday as there is still some spectrum left.
The auction will continue on Monday.
The petition filed by a host of GSM operators along with COAI also sought quashing of department of telecommunication's decision, dated October 19, to allow enhanced subscriber-linked criterion for spectrum allocation. They also sought non-implementation of these decisions terming them unfair, unjust, illegal, arbitrary and violative of level-playing field and principles of natural justice.
The spectrum auction has already generated record amount.
Exports to China saw sustained double-digit growth for the fourth straight month in August, led by eightfold rise in iron and steel shipments.
Expressing concern over the abysmally poor rural tele-density of one per cent, the government is exploring the option of creating telecom infrastructure itself and then letting it to be shared by mobile operators who want to provide telecom services
The government has accused Reliance Infocomm of violating the licence by illegally routing international calls as local ones to avoid payment of levies to telecom PSUs.
In a sharp contrast to the boom in the telecom sector, the revenue of public sector BSNL may take a hit of Rs 6,500 crore (Rs 65 billion) in the current financial year adversely affecting the telecom monolith's profitability.
The much-talked merger of the two state-owned telecom giants -- Mahanagar Telecom Nigam and Bharat Sanchar Nigam -- is understood to have been put on hold
Facing flak over its order to block access to 857 pornographic and humour websites, the government on Tuesday lifted ban on all those websites that do not feature child pornographic content.
In a jolt to Internet service providers, telecom tribunal TDSAT on Tuesday upheld the government decision that virtual private network offered by them was not part of their ISP licence
Kick starting the process of allotting new telecom licences, the government on Tuesday sought clarifications from all the applicants on as many as 25 issues relating to eligibility criteria. The department of telecom (DoT) has asked all the companies to submit by December 13, clarifications, information or supporting documents as on date of application.
DoT has rejected the demand of Vodafone India for licence extension in three circles.
While everybody is talking about the vast potential of 5G, the uptake of such services in India depends on operators getting around 100 Mhz 5G spectrum. At the reserve price proposed by Trai, getting this spectrum will cost a telco around Rs 490 billion. Which amount could be difficult for operators to mop up, given the financial stress they are undergoing, says Kiran Rathee.
The decision had been communicated to the department of telecommunications, a senior official of the department told Business Standard.
The manner in which India has allowed the rule of law to be subverted for over eight years is tragic, notes former additional solicitor general of India Bishwajit Bhattacharyya.
Pitroda, who pioneered the telecom revolution in India, added that government will open four large data centres to enable the flow of information up to the panchayat level.
Finance Minister P Chidambaram has asked UK-based Vodafone Group, which is facing a tax liability of over Rs 11,200 crore in India, to give its view on the long-pending matter in writing, a senior official said.
Aditya Birla group company Idea Cellular and US-based wireless operator Verizon are all set to get the Letters of Intent for long distance services following clearance of their applications by the Department of Telecom (DoT). Official sources said the applications have been put forward for the Telecom Minister's approval. Idea is awaiting LoI for International Long Distance services while Verizon's application is for both National and International Long Distance services
Vodafone on said it is seeking legal advice to challenge the Bombay High Court order that dismissed its plea against the I-T department's Rs 12,000 crore (Rs 120 billion) demand in tax and penalty on the company's acquisition of Hutchison Telecom in a deal of about Rs 50,000 crore (Rs 500 billion).
The Department of Telecommunications is set to issue guidelines for telemarketers in order to check unsolicited commercial calls.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday announced a new job creation scheme by giving subsidy to those establishments that make new hires. The subsidy would be to cover for retirement fund contributions by employees as well as employers for two years, she said. Employees contribution (12 per cent of wages) and employer's contribution (12 per cent of wages) totalling 24 per cent of wages would be given to establishments for two years, she said. Under the Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rozgar Yojana, every Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO)-registered establishment taking new employees would get this subsidy.
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