The National
Telecom Policy 2011(now it has to be 2012 since delayed) is expected to be
finalized and announced by the Government in the second half of 2012. This policy
is expected to clarify certain issues based on which the private telecom operators will decide
their strategy. Hence much of their activity for expansion etc will be in the
second half of this year. Till then they will consolidate what they have and
will make only incremental moves.
The private
telecom operators are expecting clarity
on the following in the new policy—whether be One
India License instead of the present system of taking 22 license for each of
the 22 circles separately will be introduced, how the migration from the
existing to the new system of licence has to take place, what will be license
fee and spectrum fee in the new policy, how the licenses expired will be renewed
and on the basis of what terms and conditions, the terms and conditions of the spectrum sharing and sharing in the
prposed new policy, whether the new policy will go in the direction of
encouraging the banks to come forward to provide low interest rate lending to
them, how mergers and acquisitions will be allowed in the new policy, what will
be the provision in the new policy for procuring the equipment etc.
In the first
half of the year 2012 the private telecom operators will lobby and pressurize
the Government to make the policy suitable for increasing their profits. While
doing this, there will be some clash between them –between old operators and
new operators and between CDMA operators and GSM operators. But overall they
will combine and pressurize the Government to bring the policy suitable for
them.
Meanwhile, in
view of the debts they have incurred for procuring 3G spectrum and in view of
the fall in the revenue, the private operators will increase the call rates.
But there will be no increase in the service quality since there will be no
considerable additional investment in the first half of this year. They will be
mostly concentrating on 3G services in metropolitan areas and on revenue
generating customers and will be discontinuing the “use less” customers. But as per the experts, it will take another
two years to make the consumers ready for the 3G services in a large scale. The new entrant operators, who failed to grow,
will continue to lie low, awaiting potential acquirers and thus leaving more
business opportunities in the hands of the established players. The acquisition
of small players by large players will take place after the new telecom policy
clarifying the issues like how much the spectrum of the acquired company will
be allowed to be utilised by the company that acquired it etc.
The intra circle
roaming agreements signed between Airtel, Vodafone and Idea for providing the
3G services in the circles where they do not have 3G spectrum, by sharing the
3G spectrum of the partner in the agreement having the spectrum in the
concerned circle was sought to be cancelled by the DoT, but these operators
petitioned the TD SAT and got a stay. But it will come up for hearing on
3-1-2012. But this is about the present period only and in the new telecom
policy the Government is moving towards allowing spectrum sharing, thus making
the illegal act of spectrum sharing official and legal.
The Reliance
Industries (Not Reliance Communications, which is another company), which is
the only company among private operaters having pan India BWA (Broadband
Wireless Access) spectrum is likely to start providing the BWA data services by
the end of 2012.
While the
private operators are thus pressurizing the Governement to make the new policy
more and more favourable for them (the meaning implied in this is to make it
more and more negative towards PSUs like BSNL, MTNL, ITI etc), while the Prime
Minister and the Communication Minister and the DoT are already favourable to
the private operators and meeting with them and discussing with them as many
times as possible to listen to their demands, the PSUs BSNL, MTNL and ITI etc
have no such leverage with the Government to place and discuss their demands
effectively. The managements of BSNL/MTNL/ITI etc are at best able to write
letters to the Government to detail their issues, but they cannot demand like
the private operators. The only force capable of championoing the demands for
suitable policy encouraging the BSNL/MTNL/ITI etc is the employees of these
PSUs. These PSUs are facing losses due to the anti-PSU and pro-private policies
of the Government. In case the PSUs are not there in the telecom sector, there
will be no body to provide seervices in the loss making areas and the national
security in the communications will be much more threatened and there will be
no scope for self reliance in telecom secom sector development.
Hence it is
essential for the trade unions of all the PSUs in telecom sector to unite and
pressurize the Government for bringing provisions favourable to the PSUs in the
new telecom policy. The trade unions in other seectors and the left parties and
progressive forces will be along with the telecom trade unions in this
struggle. Thereefore in the first half of 2012, it is the task of the trade
unions in the PSUs of the telecom sector to pressurize the Government for a
policy favourable for the PSUs. The strike on 15-12-2011 in BSNL is a step in
this direction. But it has to be carried forward by lobbying with the MPs of
all parties to pressurize the Government for strengthening the PSUs, and by
participating in the general strike on 28-2-2011 against the anti-people,
anti-PSU policies of the Government and by extending better services to the
people.
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