A Raja, Communications Minister ruled out auctioning 2G spectrum to new players in order to maintain level between new and existing service providers.
The Communications Minister stated that the government can not adopt auctioning route for existing 2G spectrum due to legal barriers. Since the government has already announced the 3G policy, so government will allocate frequency on that basis only. Bids by Bharti Airtel followed by Idea Cellular for 4.4 MHz additional spectrum has raised spectrum speculations. Bharti had offered Rs 2,650 crore reserving the right to increase the bid further, while Idea had written a letter to telecom secretary expressing its willingness to participate in the bidding process. Raja stated that the auctioning of 2G spectrum will create a level of playing in favor of existing GSM players.
