Minister for communications and IT, A Raja, on Tuesday said that the auction of

RELATED ARTICLES Government to put stress on direct tax collection

3G spectrum would be completed by March. The department of telecom (DoT) is likely to issue the notice inviting applications (NIA) for 3G spectrum auction this week.

“The government is very keen to complete the 3G auction process well within this financial year,” Raja said on the sidelines of an event. Delayed by more than a month, the department is yet to issue the NIA inviting prospective bidders for 3G spectrum. The NIA was earlier scheduled to be issued on December 8.

The delay in auction of 3G spectrum was due to the differences between the finance ministry and ministry of communications over the payment of the fee by successful 3G bidders and the availability of spectrum slots. Last week, the empowered group of ministers (EGoM) failed to reach any consensus on the 3G auctions, with the panel saying that “discussions on some of the issues related to 3G are on.” The EGoM is yet to resolve differences between the defence ministry and department of telecom. However, DoT is contemplating to carry out the auction by mid-February.

PTI adds: The government is understood to have decided to allow four private players in the 3G telephony space in five circles, while restricting competition to three private operators in the rest of the country for want of spectrum.

According to sources close to the development, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee has asked telecom minister A Raja to go ahead with the auction of third generation spectrum (air- waves to transmit voice and data) without further delay. Mukherjee, who is heading an empowered group of ministers (EGoM) on 3G, is understood to have discussed the matter with prime minister Manmohan Singh to take a final decision on the number of players to be allowed to offer 3G mobile telephony.

The government expects to earn Rs 35,000 crore from sale of spectrum in the present financial year and the EGoM had earlier decided to auction four blocks of spectrum throughout the country but the department of telecom (DoT) could not take a decision due to persistent differences with the defence ministry, which controls bulk of the spectrum.