Bharti Airtel received the spectrum allocation letter within hours of making an advance payment to the telecom ministry, Bharti Enterprises founder and chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal said on Thursday. This is the first time ever that the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has distributed the spectrum allocation letter on the day of making the advance payment.
“Airtel paid Rs 8,312.4 crore for spectrum charges and within hours was provided with letter of allotment for designated frequency bands. Allotment of E band was given along with spectrum as promised. No fuss, no tracking, no running around corridors and no high demands.” This is easy business at work at its best,” Mittal said in a statement.
The Department of Telecom has received a payment of around Rs 17,876 crore from service providers – Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio, Adani Data Networks and Vodafone Idea for the spectrum they won in the recent auction. While all telecom operators have decided to make payments in 20 annual installments, Bharti Airtel has paid Rs 8,312.4 crore, equivalent to four annual installments.
“In my more than 30 years of first-hand experience with DoT, this is a first! Business as it should be. Leadership at work – Right at the top and at the helm of telecommunications. What a change! A change that can change this nation will strengthen its dreams of being a developed nation, Mittal said.
Airtel acquired the 19,867.8 MHz spectrum by securing a pan-India footprint in the 3.5 GHz and 26 GHz bands and choosing to buy low and mid band radio waves. The country’s largest ever telecom spectrum auction received record bids worth Rs 1.5 lakh crore, with Mukesh Ambani’s Jio taking nearly half of all airwaves sold with a bid of Rs 87,946.93 crore.
Reliance Jio made payments of Rs 7,864.78 crore, Vodafone Idea Rs 1,679.98 crore and Adani Data Networks Rs 18.94 crore. India’s richest man Gautam Adani’s group has submitted bids worth Rs 211.86 crore for 400 MHz in a band not used for offering public telephone services. Telecom tycoon Sunil Bharti Mittal of Bharti Airtel made a successful bid of Rs 43,039.63 crore, while Vodafone Idea Ltd bought the spectrum for Rs 18,786.25 crore.
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