The Union Cabinet is likely to take up on Wednesday the Department of Telecom’s (DoT) proposal for relaxation is spectrum holding cap, which includes removal of the intra-band cap of 50% spectrum holding by operators in a circle.

It will also consider the proposal for allowing operators to hold 35% of the total spectrum assigned in a circle against the current cap of 25% as well as the proposal that an operator should not have more than 50% of all the sub-1GHz bands like 700, 800, and 900 Mhz put together, sources said.

These proposals from part of the recommendations made by Trai in November last year, which were then cleared by the telecom commission in January. This had come up following a consultation process with the operators after the DoT asked the regulator to examine the current caps following the government appointed inter-ministerial group suggesting that the caps should be relaxed.

Another official source said that government will again review the spectrum caps after the World Radiocommunications Conference (WRC) next year. The event is scheduled in Sharm el-Sheikh (Egypt) from October 28 to November 22, 2019.

Explaining the rational behind the revision post-WRC, the official said, “This time WRC will take up 5G spectrum bands. This is a very important event and the conference will identify bands on which the 5G eco-system will be developed”.

WRC, which is held every three to four years, reviews, and if necessary, revises the radio regulations governing the use of radio-frequency spectrum including other crucial issues related with telcommunications.

Last week on the sidelines of the Mobile World Conference in Barcelona, Bharti Airtel chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal had expressed similar views. He told FE, “The real 5G allocation of spectrum will start bringing in with some band which are day-to-day, but eventually the eco-system will be developed on the bands which are decided in WRC 2019.”

Another senior official said, “The proposal, if cleared, will enable operators to create a better LTE capable 4G networks as they can optimise their spectrum holdings in a much more efficient manner”.

DoT’s view is that relaxation in spectrum caps provides optimum spectrum efficiency and utilisation as well as encourages consolidation in the sector, which is going through a rough phase and is saddled with a debt of more than Rs 4.60 lakh crore a major part of which is spectrum related.

Industry sources said that in the immediate term it would benefit Vodafone India and Idea Cellular who are merging their operations and were breaching the intra-band cap of 50% in five circles.