Raja faces flak on spectrum issue; Opposition walk out

New Delhi, Jul 27 (PTI) Facing attack from Opposition
which alleged "monumental scam" in the spectrum allocation,
Union Telecom Minister A Raja Monday threw the ball in the
court of regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India
(TRAI) to revisit the entry fee for telecom licenses.

In his nearly two-hour reply to the debate on the
functioning of his ministry in the Rajya Sabha (Upper House of
Indian Parliament), Raja took shelter in the TRAI guidelines
at different times for the entry fee for the telecom license
costing Rs 1651 crore along with spectrum in 2007.

However, a dissatisfied united Opposition including
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Left parties demanding a
Joint Parliamentary probe, staged walkout.

Raja who skirted the demand for JPC, said TRAI is a
statutory body and it was for it to revisit the entry fee.

Defending the policy of giving licenses without
auctioning spectrum, Raja said the rules have resulted in
higher tele-density and huge revenue for the Government.

"We have so far collected Rs 68,000 crore. In 2007-08
alone the Government got Rs 23,000 crore", he said.

However Leader of Opposition Arun Jaitley accused him of
"skirting core issue" whether the Rs 1651 crore license fee
was a fair value and described the episode as "huge monumental
scam" before leading a walk out.

Last year Unitech and Swan -- after bagging the licenses
for Rs 1651 crore each -- sold stakes to foreign partners at
huge premium. Unitech sold 67 per cent for Rs 6120 crore to
Norway's Telenor leading to an outcry over alleged
under-valuation of radio frequency.

Raja said TRAI in 2001 had recommended that entry fee for
telecom licenses should be nominal and subsequently raised
the revenue share to 10 per cent based on increased subscriber
base but did not hike the entry fee from Rs 1651 crore.

"If TRAI tomorrow comes with a new entry fee, we will
have no problem. It can suo motu look into the hike in the
entry fee", he said.

To this, Jaitley said TRAI in 2007 said the entry fee
decided in 2001 did not determine the realistic value of the
spectrum and needed to be linked to market mechanism.

Raja admitted TRAI has suggested this but maintained that
its recommendations were broadly based on affordability and
increasing tele-density which would not have been possible by
auction of spectrum.

He said before 1999, telecom licenses were auctioned and
led to huge loss by the private players who bid very high and
could not get subscribers to sustain it. Later Government had
to come out with revenue-share policy.

On the issue of Government rolling back the date of
inviting applications for telecom licenses, Raja said the
reason behind fixing September 25, 2007 as the cut-off date
after seeking applications till October 1, 2007 was to have
"reasonable restrictions on the huge flow of applications".

Defending his decision to grant licenses under the FCFS
(First-Come-First-Serve) basis, he said under this policy 51
licenses were issued when Arun Shourie and Dayanidhi Maran
were telecom ministers.

Raja said the department has now put in a lock-in period
of three years on equity sale by promoters of the new telecom

"We have not departed from TRAI recommendations. If you
say TRAI has failed or the department has failed to refer the
matter to TRAI, it is a different matter", the telecom
minister said.

Sitaram Yechury Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M)
said two companies offloaded stake for about Rs 10,000 crore
after getting it for Rs 1651 crore each.

"This is a discrepancy... we suspect this is a scam. Was
there any genuine reason to keep it (entry fee) so low?" he
asked.

Yechury said whether it is an act of commission or
ommission both qualify as acts of corruption under the Indian
Penal Code.

His colleague Brinda Karat demanded a JPC. PTI ANA
anu
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