The Indian Space Association (ISpA) on Wednesday said that the Supreme Court order in 2012 in the 2G case, which ruled that spectrum should be allocated through auctions, does not apply in the case of spectrum for satellite services. Opposed to the demand by some of the telecom operators that spectrum for satellite services should be auctioned, ISpA, which counts members such as Bharti Enterprises-backed OneWeb, Hughes, Inmarsat, Dhruva Space, among others, is batting for administrative allocation of satellite spectrum.
“If we go by the 2G judgment, it was specific only to the allocation of spectrum from September 2007 to September 2008. It was in response to a Presidential reference and the court was not talking about auction in general,” AK Bhatt, director general of ISpA said.
He said that auction as an economic choice of disposal of natural resources is not a Constitutional mandate. “The honorable court said that it is the prerogative of the government to decide the method of alienation of public resources, provided the method is transparent, fair and backed by social or welfare purpose,” Bhatt added.
Comments from the Indian Space Association comes at a time when the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has come out with a consultation process seeking stakeholders’ comment on the best way to allocate spectrum for satellite services.
Interestingly, in its reference, the department of telecommunications (DoT) has asked the regulator to auction the satellite spectrum. Further, it has also asked Trai to explore feasibility and procedure of sharing auctioned spectrum among multiple service licensees.
“Nowhere in the world, the satellite spectrum in the 28 GHz band has been auctioned. This spectrum is a shared spectrum and if it is auctioned it will kill competition in the space segment,” Bhatt said, adding that the government has to decide whether it needs to prioritise immediate cash or economic growth in long term.
He said that the space sector is an emerging sector and the government’s vision is to promote startups in this segment. If the spectrum is exclusively taken by deep pocketed players, then smaller players would not be able to grow in the space segment.
Satellite communication is extremely useful for providing broadband services in remote, hilly and inaccessible regions. It is also the only medium through which communication can be established in disaster zones when normal communication is affected, according to experts.
With regard to technical complexity of auction, ISpA said it is difficult to design an auction that meets the needs of all stakeholders. The design of satellite auctions needs to take into account issues such as orbital slots, interference management, and spectrum sharing (multiple users).