After several missed deadlines, the government has finally cleared the cloud of uncertainty over

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the third-generation (3G) spectrum auctions. The ministry of communications and IT on Wednesday announced that the auctions would be held on April 9. The notice inviting applications from prospective bidders will be issued by the department of telecom on Thursday.

In the past three years the ministry missed more than four deadlines to conduct the auctions. The ministry had earlier scheduled to hold the auction on January 14, but failed due to confusion over availability of 3G spectrum.

According to the statement issued by the ministry, the auction for Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) and WiMax would be conducted two days after the close of 3G auctions. The government has fixed the reserve price of 3G spectrum at Rs 3,500 crore and BWA or WiMax spectrum at Rs 1,750 crore. At present the department has two slots each for 3G and BWA spectrum.

Tata Teleservices MD Anil Sardana said, “We are glad that the government has announced the revised schedule for the 3G auction and we look forward to the entire process being completed within the given time frame. 4G is being introduced in many parts of the world and the government has also started the consultation process for the same.”

Idea Cellular chief corporate officer Rajat Mukarji said, “We are happy with the new timetable. The pending spectrum policy, merger and acquisition rules needs to be announced as well to allow rational bidding.” New operators such as Uninor, Sistema Shyam, however, declined to comment.

According to the MoU signed between ministry of communications and IT and ministry of defence in May 2009, defence had agreed to vacate 45 MHz (25MHz of 2G and 20 MHz of 3G) spectrum to the DoT for commercial allocation to telcos. The MoU stated that DoT would set up an alternative fibre optic network, which will be used for wireless communication by defence. The defence ministry had indicated it would release 10 MHz of 3G spectrum as a first step in three months and 5 MHz in 2G spectrum.

The 3G spectrum auction, proposed to be carried out within this year is likely to generate between Rs 20,000 crore to Rs 25,000 crore to the government exchequer. State-owned PSUs BSNL and MTNL have already been allocated 3G spectrum and both have rolled out the services.